


Hazard (Edited Draft 4)

by AltFire



Category: Original Work
Genre: Child Abuse (mentioned), Crimes & Criminals, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Hate Crime (mentioned), Homophobic Language, Human Trafficking (mentioned), M/M, Misgendering, Organized Crime, Transphobia (Mentioned), Unrequited Crush, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-21
Updated: 2016-05-13
Packaged: 2018-05-15 09:21:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 31
Words: 66,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5780335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AltFire/pseuds/AltFire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kris Palmetto, better known by his alter-ego “Hazard,” is a 30 year old, nonbinary criminal known for his unpredictability and terrorism. His life goes downhill when he is approached by the biggest power in the local underworld - the Court. Headed by the Queen, the Court will not rest until Hazard has joined their forces, or he is dead.</p><p>*This is not the final draft.*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. "I'm a good person."

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally heavily inspired by GTA!AU fics (especially Achievement Hunter ones) but kind of... exploded into its own thing. I've gone through it a thousand times since I wrote the first draft during April 2015's Camp NaNoWriMo, but if you see any errors or have any questions, leave a comment or find me on tumblr @grunkle76 (my main) or @raylommen (my writing blog).
> 
> Thanks so much! -Ray

“You’re comin’ with me, bud,” Kris growled, wheezing, while grabbing his new hostage’s collar and dragging him out from under his desk and along behind him.

One of his colleagues shouted something that might have been his name, but honestly, Kris couldn’t care less what the guy’s name was. The cops’ heavy booted footsteps pounded behind them while Kris and his terrified new friend sprinted across the office. Kris could almost distinguish what they were yelling, muffled English and Spanish in the stairwell he’d just vacated, but then he found the next set of stairs and took them two at a time. Damn, what floor were they on now? This had to be the tenth, at least. He could barely feel his legs, no matter how in shape he might have been. And he definitely was in shape, otherwise he would have given up a long time ago. Stairs were the _worst_.

At the landing, he turned around to watch his hostage slowly pull himself up the stairwell, using the handrail like a lifeline. Kris rolled his eyes.

“C’mon, ya goddamn lardass, this ain’t nothin’,” he said, muffled through the tape wrapped around his head. “I just ran up nine other flights o’ these damn stairs, you can climb this one.”

The hostage picked up the pace, but didn’t reply. When they got to the landing, Kris pushed him out of the doorway first. The door opened outward, a blessing.

“Move!” shouted a gravelly voice, and the hostage tried to comply and jump to the side, but Kris’s vice-like hold on the back of his suit jacket kept him in place.

“Nah, thanks,” Kris shouted back. He could hear the footsteps behind him getting closer, probably about to enter the stairwell. This could’ve been going better. He rolled his shoulders, keeping his cool. Or at least, trying to.

He edged out from the stairwell, keeping his front covered by his makeshift meat-shield and his back to the door, holding it shut. None of the police up here shot at him, or even moved, as if they were decoration, turned to stone out of fear of hurting an innocent. Ah, morality.

“Y’all gonna let me pass?” Kris called. His hostage was sweating bad, poor guy smelled like a goddamn locker room. “I got some business to attend to, ah, upstairs.”

“No, Hazard,” one of the cops responded. The one who’d yelled for the hostage to move. He was an old white guy, like Kris’s hostage but older and graying. His moustache was impressive, all silver and pin-straight. Probably balding under his stupid blue hat. “You’re under arrest for, well. For a lot of things.”

“Don’t y’all gotta actually catch me for that to be the case?” His pursuers were in the stairwell, shouting and stomping. Kris leaned more heavily into the door. He couldn’t lock it behind him, and wished he had a master key for the building. That would’a been a good thing to get prior. Too bad he hated planning shit out. “‘Cause, uh. I don’t really plan on that happening.”

The door shook, snapping open several inches before his weight pushed it back, and he cracked the back of his head against the metal. He winced, grinding his teeth against the stars in his vision. Fuck. He had to run.

“Where’s the stairway?” he asked his hostage, lowly, looking for it as fast as he could, but the door was still thumping against his back. The guy was shaking, and shrugged. He was probably an elevator guy. Dammit. Kris growled in frustration, about to draw his gun, then saw the door on the wall to his left, labelled “ROOFTOP ACCESS”. _Bingo_.

“Alright, fellas, it’s been a blast,” Kris said, loudly, adjusting his grip on the hostage. He kinda wanted to stay around and shoot these guys, ‘cause they were just so much less annoying when they were bleeding on the ground and not trying to give him a concussion, but the clip in his gun was half empty, he was fairly certain, and he wanted to save the clip in his cowboy boot in case he had to fight his way out. “But I, uh. I gotta run.”

He bolted, dragging his hostage as close to his side as he could. The cops chanced a couple shots while he ran, and he heard one skim past his ear, catching his breath in his throat. Aside from that, they were being painfully careful. Civilian, and all.

Technically, Kris was a civilian too. Though wearing black-and-yellow striped hazard tape as a mask and pulling shit like this probably made him a special case.

The cops from the stairwell didn’t care as much about hitting the civilian, or they were made a little braver by their better angle, but either way, one of them managed to get Kris in the back of his thigh. He ignored it as best he could, still barely able to feel his legs after running up the damn stairs, and when he made it to the roof access stairwell he didn’t stop to check the damage. He stopped at the top, though, putting his hands on his knees to breathe for just a second.

“Sorry, bud, just gimme a second. Watch, _ah_. Watch the door.”

The hostage did as he was told. So far, after the initial scuffle with the cops on the first floor, Kris hadn’t had to draw his gun even once. His reputation spoke for him, he supposed. The perks of being a repeat offender.

With the hostage holding it shut, Kris wandered the roof, looking for a better way to block off the door. No luck, of fucking course – they kept their damn roof clear, for whatever reason. Would it be so hard to leave a pipe, or a two-by-four, or any damn thing at all? This whole game had been one fuckup after another, when he didn’t kill the receptionist before she was able to call the police, all the way up ten flights of stairs. He’d envisioned something a little more theatrical, with three victims on the edge of the roof and an hour of negotiating his demands, then throwing the money (in loose bills) off the edge as a big “FUCK YOU,” to the city at large. Then he’d kill the hostages and, uh. Get away. Somehow.

That obviously wasn’t happening. He could hear shouting from the stairwell.

Alright. _Breathe_. Time to hurry the fuck up, then.

“Okay, buddy, time to get moving,” he said, moving to the front wall and looking down at the street. There were still cops down there, somehow. It’d felt like the whole damn La Sierra Police Department was in the building behind them.

“Wh-what are you going to do to me?” The first time the guy had spoken and it was that? Typical.

“Kill ya, moron,” Kris huffed. “I’m Hazard. I’m not exactly known for leaving people behind.” Kris gestured for him to approach. “Now get the fuck over here. You’re going over the edge.”

The hostage balked. “A-aren’t you going to demand a- a ransom or something? Like a hostage?”

“I was hoping to, yeah. But I can’t lock the door, and there are way more cops than I, uh. Than I foresaw. Than I’d foreseen.”

The guy still didn’t move. He was holding the door, still. “I don’t- I don’t want to die.”

“Cool. I didn’t ask.” Kris left the ledge, and finally drew his pistol. “You either go over with a hole in your head, or ya go over screaming. I think the screaming would be cooler. I mean, just my opinion, but I’d rather scream than die quiet.” He just shook his head, reminding Kris more and more of a baby. Fucking Christ, guy. “I’m not fucking playing a game here, I need you to go over the edge, like, yesterday. I need to get the fuck out of here.”

“I can’t- I can’t do it. You’re gonna have to shoot me.”

Kris groaned, loud and drawn out like a bratty teenager. “Oh my god, you’re really gonna be like this? Jesus Christ, I’m a good person, I don’t deserve this shit.” He took aim and shot out both of the guy’s knees, rolling his eyes all the while. The hostage screamed, blood soaking his cheap gray slacks. He collapsed to his- well, to his knees, and seemed to realize his mistake a little late. He slumped to his side, tears streaming down his patchy five o’clock shadow pitifully. Kris grabbed one arm roughly and with what felt like the last dregs of strength in his legs, drew the guy up. He dragged him to the edge and threw him over without watching him fall.

The door burst open and Kris sprinted through the dense crowd of police officers, the quarters too close for any of them to try shooting, jumping down the stairs and rounding the corner. All of them had followed him and his hostage up into the stairwell, like fucking idiots, and left a clear shot for him to run back to the other stairs. By the time they’d decongested and started following, he was gone. As one mind, the police herded toward the stairs he’d taken up here in the first place and sprinted to the next floor.

Kris had assumed they’d do that. Hence why he changed direction, and was in the elevator.

The tape was constricting his breathing and muffling whatever shitty muzak they had hooked up to this thing, but he couldn’t take it off yet, panting wet and hot through his mouth. If Kris Palmetto walked out of the building, that’d raise more questions than if Hazard left. He left his leather jacket on too, and the tape on his palms. He could take it off when he got home. He knew that. It was just frustrating. The plastic and the heat and his sweat were all making it very uncomfortable. It was like there was no damn AC in the whole building – it felt every bit the eighty-something it was outside. Wasn’t it supposed to get cold at night, out here in the desert? Or was La Sierra just fucked up?

He didn’t know. At least it wasn’t as humid as Charleston, and less mosquitos to boot. He could deal with the heat.

Kris got out on the ground floor, in plain view of the cops out front through the broad windows. He waved at the one guy who noticed him (and the guy balked, froze, then started shouting) and took a deep breath before running out back through the lobby to the backrooms, then the janitorial quarters, then finally to the back door. There were a couple cops back here watching the door, but before either of them could get a shot off, one’s head was blasted open and the other was on her knees, whimpering after a well-aimed kick to the gut. Kris kicked her shoulder so she fell to her back, and he stomped one time, hard, on her stomach again, over her hands. She wheezed, coughed, and he mock-saluted her before making off.

He ran for a long time, breathing harsh and shuddering. He weaved mostly through alleys and the backs of buildings, mostly abandoned. The few who were there, human garbage thrown out with the trash, were too scared to dare say a word. Hazard had that effect on people – he’d been wrapping his head and hands in black-and-yellow striped hazard tape for two years, causing chaos. He’d done everything from robbing jewelry stores to arranging hostage situations to blowing shit up. Usually he didn’t keep whatever he stole or negotiated out of police, instead destroying or getting rid of whatever it was in sight of the victims. He thought it was funnier that way, and besides, he didn’t have the connections he’d need to use the money or sell the stolen goods without getting caught or tracked down. Nonetheless, his reputation and the obvious warning that made up his disguise spoke for themselves. One homeless person in particular visibly flinched in fear when they saw him walk by, and he snickered before flitting to the next alley.

After a while he slowed down to a trot, then a leisurely stroll through the grime and the garbage. Though he could hear frantic sirens in the distance, no one had followed him from the building.

At least, none of the cops had.

Across the street from his apartment, was an alley behind a hollowed out pawn shop that Kris frequently used to unwrap his tape in privacy. He was reaching for the end of his tape when someone nearby cleared their throat.

The kid stepped out of the broken side-door of the old building, the hinges rusted and shattered years ago. She was Chinese and a couple years younger than Kris was, her short hair poorly cut in uneven, mismatched layers. Her eyes were bright (if slightly out of focus) and watching him with interest.

“You gonna strip, Haz?” she asked, her voice a low soprano, smoke-roughened and casual. “I’d pay to watch that tease.”

“You’re from the Court,” Kris pointed out, instead of replying. He’d seen her face on the news. He left his tape well alone. “Part of the group that does the heists.”

She nodded. “I’m Wrecker. I’m here on behalf of the Queen.”

Kris barked a laugh. “Are ya really? Well, I’m honored.” His tone was sour, and he glared at Wrecker. “I ain’t goin’ nowhere, ‘specially not with you.”

“What’ve you got against the Court?” She half-grinned, sauntering up to him with the bravado of someone who _wasn’t_ five-foot-four and probably less than a hundred pounds, fragile-lookin’ as a porcelain figure with half the grace and thrice the ego. Somehow her size didn’t put him at ease. When she grinned he could see a glint of metal at the top of her mouth, a ring dangling over her front teeth. It wasn’t her only facial piercing.

“I don’t like the way y’all do things,” Kris said, lowly. He mentally went over the exits (two on either side behind him, one straight ahead that led to the street), and how long it would take to lose Wrecker if he ran. He didn’t dare take his eyes off her, even to glance about and see if she had any backup. “Too much order. Not enough fuckin’ shit up. That ain’t what I’m about.”

“So you’re ‘about’ getting shot? You’re into ‘fuckin’ shit up’ with no reward?” She lowered her voice mockingly when quoting him.

Kris shrugged. He’d nearly forgotten about the bullet lodged in his leg, and it sent a wave of something unbearable up through him. He resisted the urge to shudder. “I guess so. I don’t like bein’ told what ta do.” He rolled his shoulders, ignoring the way he ached all over. Standing still had his adrenaline finally wearing off.  Everything hurt. How the hell was he gonna get a bullet outta his leg? “Now, what did that goddamn Queen of yours want?”

“You.”

Kris opened his mouth to reply, but then he was hit from behind, hard, with something metal that clanged and echoed. The last thing he saw before blacking out was a bad haircut and a glint of surgical steel in the streetlight.


	2. "I see you've had a rough night."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris wakes up somewhere he’d much rather not be surrounded by people he’d much rather not see. The Queen makes a proposal.

Kris woke up in a car, lying on his back. It was dark, but he saw flashes of streetlights through the windows whenever they passed them. He could barely open his eyes from the way his head was throbbing, and instead elected to stay passed out. He wasn’t escaping, that was for sure. His entire being seemed to be centered on the throbbing of his skull and thigh. He could almost feel exactly where the bullet sat inside, prodding at the meat of his leg, unwanted and foreign.

“Wouldn’t it be a good idea to take the tape off?” That was Wrecker – he recognized her voice, even lowered as it was.

“Perez said to leave it on if it was on.” A deeper voice, low tenor or high baritone. This one was driving, and voice closer to Kris’s ear. He spoke low, even. Reasonable. “I know you wanna see him, but orders are orders.”

“Aw, but J- Bandit, I wanna see what color his hair is, at least.”

“Why? What would you get out of it?”

“I dunno, I’m just curious. Please? C’mon, just a peek.”

Bandit paused. “His eyebrows are brown. His hair is probably brown. Maybe dark blonde, probably not.”

“Let’s check, then!”

“Perez will cut your fingers off and shove them up your ass, Wrecker. I’m not pullin’ them out for you. No.”

Wrecker went quiet. Humphed, like a six year old. “Fine. You’re no fun.”

The ride went on for several more minutes in dead quiet. No music, no more conversation. Kris drifted in and out of consciousness, maybe, or maybe that was just drifting in and out of light, he couldn’t tell. They drove pin-straight for nearly half an hour before finally turning off, slowly, like into a parking lot. Kris wanted to sit up and look out the window, at least, but the idea of moving at all made his stomach churn, motion sick and throbbing. God, he just wanted to head home and go the fuck to sleep. He had work in the morning and this ‘kidnapped’ shit was gonna fuck up his whole week, he could feel it.

They pulled into a garage, or a hangar, or some other indoor, uh, place for storing vehicles, Kris didn’t know. He was having trouble stringing together coherent thoughts. Was he losing blood? That would explain the, uh. The wooziness. Damn, what if that gunshot had hit something important, and he hadn’t realized over the adrenaline? He knew there was some sort of important vein down in the thigh; maybe that had been ruptured? Was the Court gonna patch him up at all, while they had him in custody? He heard they had good doctors on their payroll, but he wouldn’t put it past them to let him bleed out.

Wrecker and the other guy, “Bandit” or whatever (obviously codenames), slammed their doors shut in unison. The door by Kris’s head was pulled open almost gently, and two strong hands grabbed him by the underarms. He faked waking up, but the groggy deliriousness was all genuine.

“Wha- Where’m I?” he asked. He went to rub his eye and discovered his tape was still on when the back of his hand squeaked against his eyebrow. Oh, right. He’d forgotten.

“Court warehouse,” the guy said. Kris guessed this was Bandit. He was handsome, black and lean and every inch as serious as Wrecker hadn’t been, tired eyes behind black-plastic hipster glasses. Full lips pulled into a frown. “You have an audience with the Queen.” He didn’t seem happy about it, though he didn’t seem _unhappy_ either.

“She’s here?” Kris had never heard of anyone actually meeting the Queen. Not that he knew much about the Court at all, mind, aside from where their best gun dealers were and whatever he heard on the news.

Before the Court had rose up six years ago, La Sierra was full of little gangs, disjointed and constantly fighting. They were all small names with no connections and no power, running shitty drug rings and spending more time in cells than on the streets gettin’ shit done. Then the Queen had stepped in and somehow united everyone under her rule. She hadn’t been seen publicly in years, but those who had seen her back in the beginning said she was a young girl, somewhere between eleven and fifteen years old. That had been four years before Kris moved to La Sierra.

Now, two years later, the Court ran like a business, like a private military, like a multinational crime syndicate condensed in one city. La Sierra was big, but it wasn’t San Diego or LA, and it certainly wasn’t no New York, so mostly the Court flew under the radar, as invasive as they were. They ran drug trafficking, sold black market firearms, and employed contract killers, thieves, bodyguards, hackers, assassins, pilots – anything you could think of. Outside of La Sierra, the Court was unknown and low-tier. Nothing in the national media, or even state media. Only a handful of outsiders knew about the Court in the first place, probably arranged on purpose by the Queen. She had those kind of connections.

 Their most infamous dealings were their heists – elaborately planned and haphazardly executed massive undertakings, usually run only by a handful of skilled professionals. Stealing police helicopters and private planes, robbing anything from banks to convenience stores with the attention to detail one would usually save for stealing the Declaration of Independence or, hell, the President herself.

The Heist Squad (which is what the small crew called themselves) were the closest thing La Sierra had to rock stars, waving at news crew cameras and making general asses out of themselves. Kris had recognized Wrecker immediately, but now that he was thinking about it, he thought Bandit might be familiar, too. The getaway driver, maybe? His face was usually hidden by tinted glass, but Kris thought he might recognize the profile. They were the only two regular members, everyone else forgettable and temporary.

Bandit threw one of Kris’s arms over his shoulder, and Wrecker came around to do the same with his other arm. At first, Kris tried to cooperate and walk with them, but when he tried to put weight on his left leg he felt a pain like a hot poker stuck straight down through the marrow of his femur, so he gave that up right quick, letting Wrecker and Bandit drag him wherever they would. In the meantime, he focused as hard as he could on just breathing. At least being knocked the fuck out had given his aching lungs a rest after all that damn running.

The building was a warehouse, all one huge, open room, Kris realized. At the far end was something like a stage. As they drew closer, he could see that it was makeshift and old, all unfinished wood planks and uncovered underneath, revealing the shoddy, rusted support beams. On the thin wooden top there were two big bloodstains side by side off to Kris’s left, and at their side, right in the center of the stage, was the Queen.

She was sitting in a pretty normal steel folding chair, but the way she held herself it may as well have been made of solid gold. The Queen was maybe eighteen or nineteen, black and Latina mixed, he’d guess, and one of the most beautiful people Kris had ever seen, all flawless skin and bronze hair. She wore more real gold on one hand alone than Kris had ever seen in his life and looked at him like he was a cockroach who owed her a favor, or maybe like he was nothing at all.

“Drop him,” she said, and without a thought, Kris was plunked on his ass. His leg jolted and he hissed out a curse. Wrecker and Bandit backed up several paces but kept their eyes on him. There were armed guards on either end of the stage, and probably more of them at the exits. The throne was flanked as well, by an older Latina woman with slicked back hair, sunglasses, and a baseball bat at the Queen’s right hand and a young olive-skinned boy with dark hair on her left, pretty as the fake teenagers on TV. He stared at his feet for the most part, but would occasionally glance up at Kris for a fraction of a second. His expression was completely blank, and he seemed to be a couple years younger than the Queen herself.

“Hello, Hazard,” she began, smirking. Kris grunted. “I see you’ve had a rough night.”

“You could say that,” Kris gritted out. He was having trouble keeping his eyes open again. He kept looking at the kid – he looked so out of place among the big-time criminals, here. Something about him just seemed wrong. Vulnerable. “Sure as hell could’a been better.”

The Queen smiled, though she didn’t laugh at his weak attempt at humor. “I’m sure. Is that a bullet in your leg?” Kris nodded. “We’ll get that out before we send you home.”

“Home?” He hadn’t thought he’d be getting back to his apartment any time soon.

She nodded. “Of course, Hazard. Did you think we were going to be keeping you here?”

He shrugged. She did laugh this time, a little harder than he thought was really necessary, but whatever.

“No, no. You’re leaving here alive, and tonight. I just wanted to ask you a favor.”

A favor? “I don’t like the sound of that,” he said, distrust creeping up his spine, stiffening his shoulders. “Sounds like ya wanna tell me what to do.” He adjusted on his knees, straightening his back a little, and grimaced. “I don’t _like_ being told what to do.”

“That’s very interesting, though I don’t recall asking.” The woman with the sunglasses shifted her weight ostentatiously, and though her eyes were hidden, Kris could tell she was glaring him down. The Queen cleared her throat before continuing. “I have a request, and if you don’t want Wrecker and Bandit to cut off your stupid tape mask and deliver you to the LSPD, you’re going to do as I say.”

Kris bit his tongue on a retort. The thought of that steel bat against his skull made him want to hurl up a lung. He was silent for a long time, until he realized she was waiting for a reply. “Fine,” he said, at last. “I’m listening.”

The Queen smiled. “That’s what I like to hear.” She gestured, and one of the guards from the end of the stage climbed up gracefully, all raw strength. He slung his gun around his back to free up his hands, bowing shallowly at the waist toward the Queen. He was white, broad and sturdy and tall and overtly masculine. His curly hair was the same green as his cargo pants. Blue eyes flashed behind his rounded steel-frame glasses.

“Park will explain it for you,” the Queen said, gesturing toward the man. “It’s eir plan.” Oh. Not a man. Kris felt a twinge of something like guilt. _Hypocrite_.

“Thanks, Your Majesty,” said Park. Ey had an English accent and seemed to look straight through Kris. “Late this autumn, we have a heist planned. You’ve seen some of the others, I’m sure. They’re highly publicized. Exciting television, so the news does the play-by-play for weeks afterward. The police don’t like it, think it glamorizes crime, but the LSPD is so hilariously ineffectual, nobody gives a damn. We sure don’t.”

“Yeah, I know about the heists,” Kris gritted out. He didn’t live under a fucking rock. “Get on with it.”

Park glared, continuing like ey hadn’t been interrupted. “Anyway, we have a big heist planned for the first of December. And we want you to help.”

“No,” Kris said immediately. “I refuse.”

“You don’t have that option, cockhead,” Park snapped. Eir glare deepened and eir fists clenched, but ey breathed, deep. Ey smoothed out, but not gently. More like ey was pulled taught. “You’re helping whether you want to or not. You have two jobs – the second one is easy. You’re the distraction. We’re robbing a bank. The big old brick one downtown in La Plaza. You’re holding it up, keeping the police outside and the hostages in their goddamned places.”

Kris wanted to groan, throw his head back in exasperation. He hated Park already, the way ey gave orders like it was eir job (which, admittedly, it seemed to be). Ey was probably ex-military, by the stiff posture and unwavering stare. “And my first job?” he asked, resigned.

“You’re babysitting this kid.” Park reached back and grabbed the out-of-place kid by his shoulder. He looked even more vulnerable than before, though Kris couldn’t tell if that was the considerable difference in stature when he was right next to Park or if it was something else. “This is Andrea Olivieri. He’s the new kid on the Heist Squad, but he’s about as soft as any other sixteen-year-old. We need you to scare him tough.”

Kris pulled a face, but- well, the tape. “What the fuck does that even mean?”

Park looked like ey wanted to deck him for cursing at em, but ey restrained emself. “It means that you’re gonna make this little shitstain ruin his pants for three months so he won’t cock up the heist, is the fuck it means.”

Andrea didn’t look up from his feet the whole time. Kris pitied him a little, almost, but he pitied himself a lot more.

“So, what, I gotta house him? Feed him? For three months?” He still wasn’t sure how he was gonna scare a kid tough, or if that even made sense. He let that go.

“Yeah, you do. And then we pull the heist, and then you can go back to getting shot and making poor economic decisions.”

“And how do I know y’all are gonna let me go back?”

“‘Cause I just fucking said so!” Park shouted, at a tipping point. Ey seemed not to like being talked back at, which made Kris want to talk back at em even more.

“Enough, Park,” the Queen said, and Park froze, then seemed to deflate. Ey looked back at the Queen and, at a gesture, ey went back to their spot at the end of the stage. Andrea massaged the shoulder Park had been holding; ey’d squeezed him hard. He winced like it was bruising already.

“Do you understand the terms of the agreement, Hazard?” the Queen asked.

Kris’s head was swimming. He looked down and there was a small-ish pool of blood under his leg. He wondered how bad the seat of the car was, however long he was passed out there. His skull throbbed and stars were starting to spot his vision. “I mean, I guess so,” he slurred. He was done fighting, exausted and losing blood and sure as hell not _winning._ The Queen was blank faced, but the corner of her mouth was twitching like she was trying not to laugh. Or maybe his eyes were playing tricks on him, he didn’t fucking know.

“Good,” she said. She turned to the woman at her side. “Rosa, if you’d do the honors.”

In a blur of effortless motion, the woman in sunglasses hopped off the stage, approached him, and bashed him over the head with her bat.

 


	3. "Close your eyes."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris wakes up with a splitting headache and a teenager to take care of. Somehow, things are both better and worse than they were when he passed out.

“-to get up!”

Kris groaned, feeling bile in his throat and the worst headache he’d ever experienced. The back of his tape felt warm and swollen when he reached up to feel it. His head was bleeding.

He blinked his eyes open several times until the four-headed figure crouched over him converged into the kid from before- Andrea, brown eyes wide and panicked, mouth frowning and worried. Great, this was happening. And here Kris had been hoping it was a nightmare.

“Hazard, please get up, we need to get to your home, please, I keep hearing sirens and thinking-”

“Shut up, kid, holy shit,” Kris slurred, putting a hand in the air. Andrea took the cue and stood to pull Kris awkwardly to his feet. Once the world stopped swimming around him, Kris realized they were back in the alley where he had run into Wrecker. Close to his apartment, and a good place to take off his tape.

But the damn _kid_ was there.

“Close your eyes,” he ordered, voice rough, and glared blearily at Andrea until he did. Then he reached up to finally unwrap his tape.

It was a literal breath of fresh air, except it was all smog and smoke and it smelled like the dumpster not far off. Still, anything was better than his own bile and blood and sweat at this point. He heaved up against the wall, mostly acid, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, then rubbed that on his blood-soaked jeans. He took his time breathing as deep as he could. He reached back to inspect his head wound, but the bleeding seemed to have already stopped. The blood was thick and sticky in his short, bleached hair, but there wasn’t much he could do to hide that. Best just to get home and clean it out there.

He wadded up the filthy caution tape and shoved it in his jeans pocket, then grabbed Andrea’s shoulder. The kid jumped about a foot in the air.

“Can I open my eyes?” he asked.

“No. C’mon.”

Kris led Andrea down the streets of La Sierra slowly, but only slow enough so as to not seem suspicious. His limp was pronounced, and the back of his pants was soaked in blood, but he could feel the bandages wrapped around his mid-thigh, evidence that the Queen had been true to her word and had him patched up. There was still more blood in his hair, but there wasn’t anyone on the street anyway. When they finally made it to his apartment building, it was a blessing and a curse. Blessing, because he was so close to being able to rest. A curse because, well.

God, he fucking hated stairs.

In his tiny studio apartment, he shoved Andrea toward the couch and put the TV remote in his hand.

“So I can open my eyes?” Andrea asked, and his voice had changed – suddenly, he had an Italian accent.

“Uh, yeah,” Kris replied, wobbling on his feet. He grabbed the back of the couch for balance. “But uh. Don’t look at, um. At me. Just look forward.” He blinked hard, took a deep breath. “What’s, uh, what’s the accent?”

“Mine,” Andrea said. He turned on the TV. “I’m Italian.”

“But outside-”

“I draw too much attention like this." He shrugged like it wasn't a big deal. "I’m an actor. I use my skills when it’s convenient.”

Kris nodded, and it made his head throb again. He stumbled to the bathroom and stuck his head under the spigot, running cold water over the wound and trying to rinse as much of the blood out of his hair as he could. He hissed in a breath through his teeth when the icy water hit the open wound, working at the tender and broken flesh with his fingers.

The sound of TV from the other room reminded him of his guest. Thinking about it made him want to bash his forehead on the spout, furious and destructive, but he didn’t. Instead, he toweled his head dry, then went to the table beside his bed to pick up his gray beanie, which he pulled on to hide the injury. He peeled off the stained jeans and inspected the bandages on his leg, but they were pristine and well-tied, so he left them alone, pulling on a pair of sweats. He tossed his leather jacket on the back of the couch.

“Close your eyes, kid,” he ordered once more, steering himself up behind Andrea and grabbing his shoulders. Andrea complied, only trembling a little bit under his hands, and Kris directed him up and around the couch. Only two rooms branched off from the main studio – the bathroom, and a linen closet. Seeing as Kris had no “linens” aside from one set of spare blankets and sheets, the closet was mostly clear, and Andrea fit nicely inside if he stood pin straight. Kris closed the door and locked it with his house key.

“I- Hazard! What are you doing?” The kid went from docile to hysterical at the drop of a hat, it seemed. Or, well. The locking of the closet door. There was a short sound of struggle as he turned around in the small space to bang on the back of the door with both hands.

“I’m going out,” Kris called through the door. He shoved his feet back into his boots and grabbed his keys. “Stop hitting the door. I don’t trust you with my shit. I’ll be back.” He crossed the living room to turn the TV back off.

“Let me out! You can’t just-” Andrea's voice cracked and he kicked the door, and Kris wanted to reopen it to slap the kid across the face, but he didn’t. He sighed. All this self-restraint was _exhausting._

“Fucking watch me, kid,” Kris mumbled, more to himself than anything, and with that he left the apartment.

He went straight to the local every-damn-thing store, which wasn’t a Wal-Mart, but it obviously wished it was. It may as well have been. He wandered to the back of the store, close to the athletics department and by the ski equipment (though why anyone would need skiing stuff this close to the Mexican border was anyone’s guess), wondering idly why he hadn’t purchased a black ski-mask before.

He’d never had anyone in his apartment that only knew him as Hazard before, he supposed. Or anyone in his apartment, full stop. Well, save Paloma. Still, it seemed like an obvious thing for someone with a masked secret identity.

While he was there, he stocked up on frozen pizza (the kid was a teenager, and Italian – surely he’d eat pizza?), and bought some extra locks for the doors. At the last second, he grabbed a small, steel combination safe. He ignored the cashier’s weird look until she spoke up.

“Weird night?” she asked, looking at his bizarre assortment of items. Kris checked his watch – it was nearly four AM. He cracked a grin, nodding, and she blushed a little, tucking a deep indigo lock of hair behind her ear. She had an impressive collection of buttons on her bright red lanyard, and if he didn’t still kind of feel like he was dying, he would maybe stay and talk to her.

“You wouldn’t believe,” he said instead, wryly, and she giggled a little as she rang him up.

Walking back to his apartment in the dark of the early morning was refreshing. His head was mostly cleared, and though he ached all over, nothing really ‘hurt’ anymore. He felt almost blissful, almost numb. Painkillers?

The streets of La Sierra were mostly vacant aside from litter. He saw a couple Court members around, disguised as street trash, loitering on corners and watching everything. He waved at one that looked too hard at him. He felt up the back of his beanie to check that the blood hadn’t sept through, and it hadn’t. It was probably nothing. They watched everyone like hawks.

Without his tape he felt naked, about as vulnerable as Andrea had looked up on stage by the Queen. What did she expect of him? And why him, why Hazard, of every person she could pick? There had to be something more to this, another side that he wasn’t seeing. To distract himself he looked up to maybe admire the stars, but he was painfully reminded that he was in southern California, not South Carolina. All smog and light pollution, the sky was as matte a black as he had ever seen it. He adjusted his grip on the cardboard box his safe came in, tucked under one arm, and the plastic bags in his other hand. The extra weight didn’t help his leg wound; the bullet was out, but the path it had ravaged was still there.

When he finally got back to his apartment, it was dead silent. He could almost forget that Andrea was even there, if not for the quiet whimper he barely heard when he walked past the closet door. He set down his bags and pulled the mask on, a little miffed he had to hide his face in his own damn house, but it was only a couple months. He'd cope.

Andrea was sat on the floor when Kris finally opened the closet door, after putting away the groceries and putting the safe on his bed. The kid’s face was flushed and damp, like he’d been crying, and his knees were pulled up to his chest. Kris hadn’t been gone more than an hour, honestly. Pathetic.

“Get up, crybaby. We’re gonna have a chat.” He stepped back to give Andrea some space. “And you can open your eyes.”

And he did, brown eyes staring unabashedly up at him before wiping away the last of the wetness from his cheeks, pulling himself up on the door frame. Gesturing for him to follow, Kris moved over to and took a seat at his dining room table, small and round with four seats and more scratches than a cat owner. The rough, unworn cotton of the mask was uncomfortable, but it was better than hiding from a kid with his eyes shut.

“That's a new mask,” Andrea pointed out. “Is that why you left?”

“I don’t want you to see my face,” Kris said. “You work for the Court. I don’t trust ‘em, so by extension I don’t trust you. I don’t care how green ya are, I don’t care how loyal ya are to ‘em. You’re Court, you’re an enemy. Understand?” Andrea nodded. “Great. Now, what d’ya think these three months is gonna be like?”

The kid shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose I'll follow you around while you, um. While you are Hazard.”

Kris nodded, absently. Andrea had his hands in his lap, and seemed to be trying hard not to stare, bouts of intense eye contact interrupted by bouts of intensely staring at the whirls and scuffs of Kris’s table. Kris just kept his eyes on the kid. “That could work. Honestly, I don’t wanna help your goddamn Queen at all. If I had my way, I’d slit your throat right now and throw you out the window.” He sighed, almost wistful, and ignored the way Andrea’s shoulders stiffened and he stopped meeting Kris’s eyes. “But I can’t do that. Next time I wrap up, she’d grab me and turn me in." He sneered. "I wish she’d just threatened to kill me. Ain’t no bigger insult than just lettin’ someone go to jail, kid. Killin’ is kinder.” He slammed a palm on the tabletop, gently, but Andrea jumped like he’d been hit. Shaky as a mouse, this one. He resisted the urge to do just that, to hit him, to see how high he’d jump then. “Now, you’ve got the couch. Go to bed.”

“Are you- Are you leaving tomorrow?” Andrea asked. He glanced over at the closet.

“Yeah, I’ve got work at eleven.” Kris had already left the table, pulling out the spare blankets to toss them on the couch. Eleven was only, like, six hours away. He wanted to spend as much of that time with his eyes shut as he could.

“Are you going to lock me in the closet again?” Andrea’s voice was shaking, hard. Claustrophobic?

Kris thought about it for a second. “No.” He’d lock his personal shit up in the safe and lock the front door from outside. It’d be fine. Thinking about it, he locked up his wallet, keys, and the roll of hazard tape he fished out of his bedside table. Before he could forget.

“Alright.” Andrea nodded, swallowing thickly. He stood from his seat slowly. He offered a tiny smile, tight and a little afraid. _“_ _Buonanotte,_ Hazard.”

“‘Night, kid.”

\--

The sun was streaming too-bright through the windows when Kris’s alarm went off. He threw the blankets off, reaching out to slam the OFF button, but instead just knocked the whole damn digital clock to the ground, green numbers flashing 9:00 AM mockingly. He cursed, shoved the ibuprofen from his bedside table down his throat before opening his eyes to look for the noisy bitch. Once he’d found it and shut it the fuck up, he stretched, moaning like a zombie at the pain in his head. He went to run his hand through his hair, but he was met by scratchy black fabric. The ski-mask. The events of the night before rushed back to him, and a sense of dread and indignant anger broiled in his stomach. His left leg protested from the moment his feet touched the floor, and he knew it would be a bitch all damn day. A great day overall, then.

“Kid, you up?” he called, louder than necessary, wobbling only a little when he stood up. Andrea whined, and Kris leaned over the back of the couch just as he pulled the blanket up over his head. “Kid, get the fuck up!”

As fast as he’d been to complain, he was faster to get up when he thought he was in trouble. He tossed the blanket down around his waist and sat up, eyes wide but out of focus, staring up at Kris with confusion, then recognition, then something like disappointment as he, too, remembered what was going on. Kris couldn’t blame him.

“Sorry, Hazard,” he said, automatically. Kris rolled his eyes. “I, uh. Good morning.”

“There’s cereal in the cabinet, help yourself. I’m gonna take a shower.” Only four-ish hours of sleep after last night had Kris feeling a little more than dead inside, but he had work. Being a productive citizen of these United States was the pits.

While the water ran, warming up, Kris pulled his mask off and looked at himself in the mirror, rubbing a hand through his short hair and over his long, narrow jaw. He’d need to shave tomorrow, but right now he was mostly fine. His bleached hair, pale yellow as it was, was only a handful of shades darker than his natural hair anyway, so his beard grew in light. His cheeks seemed more hollow than usual, and there were bags under his eyes he hadn’t seen since high school, though not as heavy as they had been under the dull, empty eyes of a solid D student. They were usually a brighter blue, but damn, they were gray as a ghost after the night he’d had. He was glaring when he’d pulled the mask off, which caught him a little off-guard. The aching-all-over thing seemed to have accentuated his resting bitch face. Add that to the old scar on his jaw (which he couldn’t remember getting) and the notch in his left ear (from a bar fight six years ago in Tulsa) and he looked pretty scary, he had to admit. He scowled at his reflection, thin lips twisted into something ugly.

He took his time in the shower, relishing in the hot water for as long as it lasted. Andrea could wait the hour for it to come back, Kris deserved this. He’d already forgotten about the guy he’d thrown off the roof the night before. Most of his victims were forgotten that fast.

Instead, he went back over what had happened with the Court, putting names to faces. “Wrecker,” the over-excited gunwoman. On the news she always had her shotgun on her, but last night she hadn’t. “Bandit,” the getaway driver. Probably the one that knocked him out the first time. Andrea, the Italian teenager sitting at his dining room table, and apparently a little wimp. Park, green-haired and mean and nonbinary. “Rosa,” the woman with the baseball bat and sunglasses. The Queen herself, “young and beautiful” personified but infused with poison and more power than any teenager should have control of.

Why had she wanted Kris of all people to help out with Andrea, and the heist? And what was that about, including him in what was more than likely going to be an unbelievably delicate operation? He’d just fucked up a simple would-be hostage situation right before she’d spoken to him, surely she realized he was less than competent? Not that he wanted to be – he was in this for the adrenaline, the thrill, the bloodshed, the infamy. Call him theatrical, or even childish, but he felt like putting on the tape was like a supervillain suiting up, and the rush of power he had when he was out on the streets made him shiver with excitement. Being the Queen’s definition of “useful” definitely wasn’t on his wishlist.

Maybe she just wanted enthusiasm. Or maybe there was more to this than he’d thought, like he’d concluded the night before. Either way, it didn’t matter. If he didn’t help, he’d go to jail, and Christ if that threat didn’t make his blood boil.

It was kinda weird to walk out of the bathroom wearing nothing but a ski-mask and a towel around his waist, but he ignored the way Andrea stared at him.

“What are the big scars from?” he asked, referrring to the burn scars all over Kris’s chest and back, and Kris scowled. So much for ignoring him.

“Fire,” he replied shortly, digging through his chest of drawers for his work clothes. It didn’t take long, but the silence was long enough that he thought Andrea had dropped the subject.

Not so lucky, it seemed.

“What happened?” Andrea’s voice was childish and curious, and it made Kris want to hit him.

Kris huffed out an irritated breath through his nose. “I was set on fire. Not so hard a conclusion to come to.”

“Why were you set on fire?”

“‘Cause I wouldn’t shut my goddamn mouth,” he snapped, and Andrea took the hint and went back to eating his cereal. Kris went back into the bathroom to get dressed, pointedly not thinking about those fucking ugly scars, skin perpetually red and shiny and warped as hell where it had melted and reformed, or how he got them. They only peeked a little bit up out of the neck of his white polo, on the thin strip of skin visible between the mask and shirt. He sat down at the table, sideways in his seat to get his shoes on.

“Are- Are we going to be starting today?” Andrea asked, quietly, like he knew he wasn’t supposed to be talking but was too curious to stay silent.

Kris shrugged. “Probably. When I get back from work around four.” He glanced up at the clock on the oven. Nearly ten. He must have taken a long-ass shower. “I’m gonna leave in a sec. While I’m gone, don’t touch my bed or any of my stuff over by it. If you get hungry there’s pizza in the freezer, and you can get on the Xbox if you make your own account and don’t break anything. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Andrea said, obedient as the Court had probably trained him to be.

Dressed and ready to go, he called for Andrea to close his eyes. When he complied, Kris darted through the apartment maskless. He grabbed his wallet from the safe and shoved it in the back pocket of his khakis.

“When I shut the door, you can open your eyes,” he said, hand on the doorknob.

“Okay.”

“I’ll be back this afternoon. I’ll knock twice, and you’ll close your eyes so I can get the mask on, and we’ll get started on that toughening shit.”

“Alright.”

“Seeya, kid.” He was gone before Andrea could reply.


	4. "No, sir."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andrea picks through Hazard's belongings and learns he has more in common with the criminal than he'd thought. Kris goes to work and sees a familiar face.

For the first hour Hazard was gone, Andrea cried.

It wasn't something he usually allowed himself, admittedly. He didn't get much time alone these days, sharing a room with Cam and JC, and when he’d lived in El Palacio with the Queen he’d been so angry and numb that he couldn’t find it in himself to cry. Not to mention that being in constant contact with Roman, the Court’s head of Intelligence, made him feel like he was constantly being watched.

(To be fair, he probably was.)

It wasn’t full on sobbing, of course. Just- he hated being moved, sleeping somewhere new, living with strangers. He’d just gotten used to Cam’s perpetual alcohol breath and JC’s habit of staying up all night on his phone, shoving its too-bright screen in Andrea’s and Cam’s faces when he saw something funny. He’d cried the first moment he’d gotten any alone time when he’d been first moved in there, too, but- but Cam had come back to the room early and caught him. They seemed to change into a completely different person the second they realized what was going on and Andrea had let them put a skinny arm around him and stroke his hair. That had been the most sober Andrea thought he’d ever seen them.

When he calmed down again, no one around to comfort him (and he wasn’t sure he’d take the offer if Hazard ever tried), he decided to take advantage of being alone in Hazard’s apartment to maybe try and learn something about the man. Hazard’s apartment was small and about as barren and lifeless as Andrea had expected. The full-sized bed was clothed in blue and against the wall near it was Hazard’s wooden closet, closed but not visibly locked. He decided against picking through his clothes, at least. He’d keep out of anything closed in case it was too obvious that he disturbed something.

There were a couple things he could see that gave him a hint, though: Hazard had an extensive collection of old Xbox 360 games under the TV, including a worn-out cardboard special edition case of some space opera RPG that Hazard seemed to play often, if the state of the case meant anything. On one of the bedside tables (and why did he have two?) was a sketchbook and a coffee mug of pencils, and when Andrea peeked at a couple pages he noticed they were almost exclusively highly realistic portraits, mostly half-finished like the model hadn’t sat still long enough to be properly rendered. Strangers, maybe? He couldn't imagine Hazard holding something so delicate as a pencil in his scarred fingers.

Under the sketchbook was a 70-page spiral bound notebook with a yellow cover, a big number 16 scrawled on the top right corner in sharpie. A diary, perhaps? Andrea peeked in this one too, but it didn’t seem to chronicle anything. Instead there were words packed tightly on the pages, some looking like poems with rhyming ends and some clever turns of phrase, and some not words at all but numbers on a grid, looking almost like- like music. On top of the closet was what looked like a hard, leather-bound guitar case, the strap more than a little frayed and hanging down in front of the doors. Hazard was a musician? And an artist? Why the hell was he Hazard when he could have been so much more?

Though, Andrea supposed, the same could be said about himself, but it wasn’t like he’d had a choice in the matter. To Andrea’s knowledge, no one was forcing Hazard to do what he did. Still, it was interesting at the very least to have something like art, of all things, in common with the man he’d be living with for the next couple months. Both of their talents were going to waste working for the Queen.

Which reminded Andrea - where did Hazard work? He’d been dressed in a polo and dark pants like some sort of respectable service worker when he left that morning, the angry red skin of his scars peeking out the neck and the sleeves like a reminder that no matter how clean he might look, he was still dangerous. He’d read the Court’s file on Hazard before leaving and- and somehow they had nothing on him. His name and face were a mystery even though they knew where he lived, and no one knew where he worked. He didn’t have car keys on his key ring so he couldn’t work too far away if he walked every day. Andrea would maybe ask at some point, when he and Hazard got past this tense initial phase in their, uh, partnership.

For now, he planted himself on the couch and booted up the Xbox to see if that space opera was as good as Hazard seemed to think.

\--

“Get the hell out of my bar.”

Kris flinched, barely inside the door. “Paloma, please-”

“No!” she snapped, pointing at him rather accusatorily with a dirty rag. “I told you last time, if you start another goddamn fight you’d be on probation for a week!”

“But-” Kris came around behind the bar anyway, ignoring the way the few day drinkers raised their eyebrows at the argument.

Paloma glared. “No buts! You told me about Oklahoma. I looked into it - it took that Shannon woman _three years_ to get her reputation back after you left!”

Kris flinched. He shouldn’t have told her that, but- well. Brimstone was just one example, and one of the most tame. He’d lived with Paloma for half a year; he couldn’t keep his whole past a secret. “Hey, no one died! I just-”

“Just beat up three of my most loyal customers,” Paloma cut him off again, glaring over her glasses. When Kris opened his mouth to keep arguing, she held up her hand to silence him. “I heard what they was sayin’, I know they probably deserved it. You still didn’t need’a break their noses, and not on the clock.”

To be honest, Kris couldn’t remember what they’d said. He’d just- just hated the way they’d sneered and blew their smoke behind the bar, making stupid comments about Kris’s accent and hair that didn’t really bother him but gave him an excuse to walk around the bar and punch one of them so hard he fell off the bar stool, knocking his head on the hardwood floor and knocking him out cold. The other two had been easy, soft business-types made confident by whatever bullshit Kris had been givin’ ‘em.

“Fine,” Kris acquiesced, going back around to sit in front of the bar. “But I ain’t leavin’.”

She stared at him for a long moment, then shrugged. “Don’t bother me none. Just don’t fuckin’ kill anybody.”

“No promises,” Kris joked, but she glared at him until he put his hands up by his shoulder in surrender. “Fine, damn. No murder.”

Satisfied, Paloma got back to work.

She had been the first person he’d met when he moved to La Sierra two years ago, renting out the spare room upstairs and working the bar. He had a decent amount of experience with bartending, having worked in a couple over the years including the ill-fated Brimstone, even though he himself didn’t - and doesn’t - drink.

He rested his head in his arms on the bar, headache coming back to haunt him. His scalp was torn and scabbed and there was dried blood flaking off in his hair, and if he’d known he wouldn’t be working he would’a worn his beanie to cover it up. As it was, with his head bowed Paloma no doubt got a clear view of the injury, and tsked over it.

“What the hell did you do to your head?”

Kris didn’t move to face her. “Nothing,” he said, muffled by his elbow.

“Bullshit. You fucked it up real good.” She set down a glass by his head, and when he peered up at it he realized it was tea. Knowing Paloma, it was sweet enough it’d make his teeth ache, just the way he liked it. “What kind’a trouble did you get into this weekend?”

He shrugged, taking a long swallow of his tea. “I made some friends last night.”

“Friends?”

“Okay, enemies.”

Paloma heaved a put-upon sigh. “Palmetto, what is it with you and getting in fights?”

“I didn’t start this one,” Kris admitted. “I was walkin’ home and got jumped.”

She didn’t look comforted by that. “I somehow don’t believe that it wasn’t at least partially your fault.”

“Doesn’t matter. Didn’t start it.”

The door opened with a tinkle of the bell and heavy booted footsteps entered the establishment. Kris didn’t look over at who it was - probably some regular, a biker with a helmet under their arm or something. But- but then they came up to the bar and sat by him, and _holy shit_ it was the woman from last night, Wrecker, a little wobbly on her feet and wearing the biggest damn combat boots Kris had ever seen. Had she been wearing those last night?

She opened her mouth and a bunch of garbled nonsense came out, elbows on the counter and eyes unfocused. Paloma stared.

“Excuse me?”

Wrecker stared right back, or maybe slightly to the side of Paloma’s head. “I- Shit, sorry. Wrong fu- fuckin’-” She burped, long and wet and Kris sneered in disgust. “I- Beer. Please.”

Paloma frowned. “It’s a little early to be drinkin’, sweetie.” She poured some guy in a suit his second whiskey, though, while she said it.

“It’s- ugh, i-it’s a little early to be s-such a _bitch,_ lady,” Wrecker came back, focusing her glare just a little. “Just gimme a d-damn- a goddamn bottle. Whatever's- whatever's cheapest.” She slammed a palm down on the counter. "Now!"

“Hey, chill the fuck out,” Kris said, and Wrecker turned her bleary stare on him.

“... I’m drunk,” she said after a long enough time that Kris was starting to think she recognized him. “And I think- I think I’m high. I c-can’t remember.”

“‘Re you tellin’ me y’don’t know?”

She giggled. “Your voice’s funny.”

Kris rolled his eyes. “So’s yours, stranger. You’re slurrin’ so hard I can’t hardly understand you.”

“You're right,” she allowed, grinning lopsidedly at Paloma when she finally gave her a beer. “Gracias, señora.”

Paloma frowned a little deeper. “De nada. That’s all you’re gettin’.”

“But I-I’m payin’, aren’t I?”

“Not enough to get vomit off my floors, sweetie.” Paloma went back to her other customers, the few there were. Why the bar was open this early was a mystery, but not one Kris had ever questioned. Paloma liked to open and close much earlier than any other bar in La Sierra, earning a reputation as the place to go to get a cheap drink after lunch. The odd hours and Paloma’s steely condescendence kept out most habitual drunks.

Except, apparently, Wrecker.

“Fine, I’ll-” She burped again, and chased it down with a third of her beer. “I’ll g-go somewhere else. There’s a- there’s lots of bars in La Sierra, and- and like-” She counted off on her fingers, back and forth like she kept losing her place. She stared at her hands, cross-eyed, like they’d personally betrayed her. “Uh. Three or sev-seven I’m still allowed in.”

“Wonder why,” Kris said, earning a glare that didn’t quite meet his eyes.

“‘Cause I’m loud,” Wrecker informed him. “And I dr-drink too much. And I start fights.”

“You and Palmetto got that in common, eh?” Paloma said, and Kris shot her a hard look. What happened to mindin' her own business, like she'd seemed so content to just a second ago? Wrecker didn’t catch his stare, but she caught Paloma’s comment crystal clear.

“Palmetto? What’re y-you, a tree?”

“‘S a nickname.”

“Oh. You like fightin’ people?” she asked, dropping the name thing and lighting up.

Kris shrugged. “I don’t _like_ it,” he said, because that’s what a normal person would probably say. “I, uh. I guess I’m an asshole magnet.”

Wrecker laughed, snorting loudly on an inhale in a way that could’a almost been cute if it didn’t sound kind of like a pig choking to death. “Dude. _Bro._ Same.” She put an arm around his shoulders and he tensed up uncomfortably. She didn’t notice. “Just- just the other day I was- I was out and s-some dickhole kept tryna talk to me? I d-don’t even- I was so fuckin’ drunk I don’t r-real- I can’t rem’ber what th’hell he was tryna say, but I clocked the sunovabitch so hard his jaw broke!” And she laughed, like that wasn’t horrific.

Or, well. Impressive. “Where’d you hit ‘im to break his jaw?” Kris asked, morbidly curious.

“Uh-uh, you’re sure as hell not askin’ for tips-” Paloma started, but Wrecker just grinned wickedly.

“Just under the ear, b-but they gotta have their mouth open,” Wrecker went on. “It’s so funny when th-they try to act all- all, uh. In... ingidin-  in-indignant, afterwards. Like, they try to talk but they can’t!” There were honest-to-god tears in her eyes and Kris laughed a little too, mostly sympathetic but also because that mental image was pretty sweet. He’d have to try that sometime.

“I’ll have to try that sometime,” he said, and Paloma looked about ready to throw a glass across the bar at him. He put his hands up at his shoulders with a smile. “Only joking, señora.”

“No, you ain’t,” Paloma grumbled, but turned her glare off him.

There was a rhythmic buzzing behind them as Wrecker's phone sprung to life, and she downed the rest of her beer in one gulp. She patted Kris on the back too hard and stood up, swaying dramatically.

“Th-that’s gotta be Jace,” she said, giving no indication who ‘Jace’ was (Bandit, maybe?) and starting to stumble away. “I- I’ll seeya later, tree-guy.”

“You didn’t pay for your beer,” Kris reminded her and she paused.

“Oh. Fuckin’- you’re right,” she slurred and pulled a wad of twenties out of her pocket. She dropped a couple on the floor, mock-saluted the empty space between Kris and Paloma, and was gone before anyone could say a word more.

 --

Sometimes, Kris liked that he walked everywhere. It was good exercise, especially since his job was more than an hour’s walk from his apartment, plus it gave him a long time to think, and appreciate the beautiful California weather. When he’d run away from home after graduating high school, he'd done a lot of travelling, mostly by bus but occasionally if the next city wasn't too far out he'd walk. He'd gone cross-country from Charleston, South Carolina to La Sierra, staying in a lot of places along the way, working odd jobs and stealing enough to eat until he could buy his next ride. Sometimes he missed the south, where he’d spent some of the best years of his life, but in high school that had all gone downhill, fast.

Coming to terms with who he was didn’t exactly make him, uh... likeable. Not down there. And his parents never approved of his “lifestyle.” The queer thing, they could get. They could live with that. When their little boy told them he didn’t “feel like a boy,” they weren’t having any more of that shit. The confrontation had been quiet and low-key, his mother pulling him aside and telling him he'd have to get out of her house the moment he'd graduated. It hadn't ever been violent, and Kris supposed he was happy about that. No physical scars to speak of, from that incident, and if he didn’t think about it too long, he could pretend there weren’t any emotional ones either.

He ran away that night, no matter that graduation was in the morning, without saying goodbye to his brother, sisters, or friends. Along the way, during his six-plus years of being a vagrant, he... experimented. With a lot of things. People, drugs, clothes, violence. Only the violence stuck, though. People didn’t care enough to follow him, drugs made him want to skin himself alive. The clothes were the only thing he'd liked, but- only for a moment. The one time he’d tried- well. Do you wanna know how I got these scars?

(Instinctively, he rubbed at one shoulder, and itched to take his shirt off. The sun beat down hot as fire on his skin and he wanted to scream, he wanted to run, he wanted to cry. It really was too hot to be wearing long pants.)

Other times, he wished he didn’t walk. Too many memories. Too much time to think.

Back at his apartment, he knocked twice to announce his arrival, then entered. Some video game was paused on the TV, and Andrea was sat on the couch, the controller clutched loosely in his hands, eyes shut. Kris had laid the mask on the dinner table before he'd left, and presently he tugged it back on.

“Alright, open your eyes, kid. You can get back to the game, I’ve gotta change.”

In jeans and a t-shirt, Kris itched already to take off the mask. He had a feeling this wasn’t gonna work like he thought it would, but maybe he’d get used to it. He walked around and sat on the couch at Andrea’s side. The kid scooted over a little, putting more space between them so they were on either end. Kris didn’t roll his eyes.

“Um, how was work?” Andrea asked. He sounded a little nervous, but that was understandable. All of Kris’s “orders” had been to just scare the shit out of him.

Kris shrugged. “It was okay,” he said, blandly. For a long moment, neither of them said anything. Andrea picked at a loose thread on the couch cushion. Kris cleared his throat. “I should probably get started on that 'scarin' you tough,' bullshit, huh?" Andrea didn't say anything. Kris frowned. "Do you have any, uh, ideas?"

"No, sir," Andrea said.

'Sir.' That was fuckin' weird, but okay. "What, ah. What’re your skills, kid, if ya got any?”

Andrea’s expression didn’t shift at all, stony in its persistence. He kept picking at the couch, and Kris’s hands itched to make him stop. It was getting on his nerves fast. “I’m an actor. I’ve been in stage productions since I was small. I also speak three languages and my accents are accurate.”

“What languages?” Kris was impressed. He’d barely passed the two required years of French in high school.

“Italian, English, and Spanish,” he replied. “My only English accent is American, and I have a Spanish accent in, um. In Spanish.”

“That’s impressive,” Kris admitted. He wasn’t sure why he was being so agreeable with Andrea, but it was easier than trying to be scary all the time. It’d be easier to scare him later if he trusted Kris, probably. Kris didn’t like being unnecessarily mean when he wasn’t in the mood. He was usually in the mood to be mean anyway, so he liked to take advantage of his good moods when he could. “Uh. How are your people skills?”

“Good,” Andrea said immediately. “I was- the Court was training me to be, um. To be bait or a distraction, for the Heist Squad. Taking advantage of my acting.”

Kris nodded, something that was almost plan-shaped forming in his mind. “Alright. I’ve got an idea, but I can’t come with you for the setup. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

Okay, maybe he liked the 'sir,' thing. Or, at least, the obedience. “I’ma need you to go out and get a date. I don’t care who with, but preferably someone your age. Go to the mall, go wherever the fuck y’all young’uns go after school. School should be out about now.”

“A date?” Andrea screwed up his face in confusion. “Why?”

“Don’t matter why. Get a date for, uh. For that nice French place. The expensive one. This upcomin’ Saturday, ‘round seven. Understand?” Repeating himself at the end of every damn sentence made him feel like a robot, or a school teacher, but he wanted to make sure he was clear.

“Yes, sir,” Andrea said, again, just as repetitive.

Kris nodded confirmation, and gestured at the door. “Then go.”

Andrea stood, then looked down at himself. “I’m, um. I don’t have any other clothes.”

“That’s the Court’s fault. I’m bigger than you - none of mine'll fit you.”

The kid nodded, hesitantly, like he was upset with the answer but not going to complain. Without another word, he left the apartment.


	5. "Yellow."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andrea runs into a close friend while out on an errand. Baby's first Hazard game begins.

Andrea hated California. It was hot, and stank like garbage nearly a hundred percent of the time, and the people dressed like they were homeless or whores with almost no exception or in-between. Hazard was no exception, if the older man’s choice in personal attire was anything to go by; there were more holes in that band t-shirt than Andrea had in any of his own clothes.

Before he found that date, he needed to find Cam. They and JC were the closest thing Andrea had to family in this whole god-forsaken city, and they’d make sure he had his clothes.

It was quarter ‘til five when he found them, being kicked out of a bar.

“Man, fuck you, man, holy god, fuck you I’m just-” they slurred, but the door was slammed in their face. They banged a fist on the glass, glaring, before they turned around and saw Andrea watching. The haircut they’d given themself was more disheveled than usual. “Oh, shit, hey there, Andy, what’re you-” They burped, loud, and pressed a fist to their chest. “Ugh, what’re you doin’ ‘ere? You’re, uh... you’re s’posed to be with the yellow guy.”

“Hazard’s at his apartment,” Andrea responded, American accent firmly in place. He looked up and down the sidewalk, but it was mostly deserted, on this side of the street. Across the way there were a couple adults having a smoke. “He sent me out to do an, um. An errand.”

“Tha’s weird,” Cam said, then gagged hard, throwing a hand over their mouth. They looked around frantically and found the garbage can behind Andrea on the side of the street. They lunged for it and promptly retched into it for an uncomfortable amount of time. Andrea felt his own throat convulse in sympathy at the sound and smell and he looked away. “Ugh, fuck, Andy. I really gotta stop day drinking.”

“You say that every day, Cam. It’s never stopped you before.”

“Point.” They pulled up the bottom of their black tank top and wiped their mouth, exposing their pale, flat stomach for a moment. “So, uh. Why’re you- did’ya need me for somethin’? I d-don't think we're s'posed to-" They belched and Andrea cringed. "-talk.”

“I need my clothes,” Andrea said. “You guys sent me to live with a stranger with nothing but the clothes on my, um. What is it?”

“The shirt on your back, ‘s the phrase,” they supplied. “I dunno if- if Park thought about that. I can grab your shit and bring it over t-tonight.”

Andrea shook his head. “I don’t think Hazard would appreciate you coming over.” He thought for a moment, but came up blank. “Fine, I guess that will have to do. Do you know where he lives?”

“Is it that big apartment complex near where we dropped you guys off last night?” Andrea nodded. “Then yeah. I’ll leave your shit on the curb tonight.”

“Thanks, Cam.” Part of him wanted to hug them goodbye, but the blur in their eyes and the stench of alcohol cut that train of thought off promptly. “I have to go. I’ll see you later.”

“Buh-bye, Andy.” They half grinned before turning and walking down the sidewalk away from him, probably gonna go look for another bar to get kicked out of. Damn alcoholic.

“Goodbye, Cam. Say 'hi' to JC for me.” He waved and began walking the opposite way.

He knew his best bet was probably the mall, not that he knew where it was. He wandered the streets for a long time, trying to see if he could see anyone around his age, but it was all older kids smoking weed in alleys or members of the Streets faction of the Court.

Streets agents were usually teenagers like himself, though with less useful skills. They mostly manned front-gangs, faking as normal street thugs that weren’t part of the Court. They ran most of the normal stuff, like gun and drug trafficking, and persuading the few smaller gangs that still existed in La Sierra to join up with the Court. They had counterparts in the Windows faction, which were sleeper agents that got involved with legitimate businesses to help gather information for future heists, or get in on those involved in white-collar crime.

Police estimates say there are a little over a hundred members of the Court. They’re not even close.

Andrea’s feet were getting tired by the time he finally found La Plaza Mall, in the middle of downtown. An old department store they built up and off of, it wasn’t exactly beautiful, brick and concrete meeting and contrasting in a way that was less than pleasing to the eye. Andrea had been young when he left Italy, and he’d never spent a long time in Rome or any other of the beautiful cities, but he’d spent enough time there to know that nothing in La Sierra would ever compare to Roman architecture, no matter how hard the Americans tried to mimic the old world charm. They were too obsessed with speed and modernity.

Inside the air was chill and clean, almost like a hospital from the over-filtered air. The stores rose up five stories, all encircling the center. On the bottom floor was a huge, round fountain and, in the ceiling so high up above, was an enormous domed skylight. There was a stark contrast in lighting between the middle commons and the surrounding storefronts, shaded as they were. No matter how many ugly fluorescent lights they installed, the light would never compare to the glittering waters of the fountain. They were less than eye-catching, and definitely less than enticing.

Around the fountain were benches, and on a couple of them were the teenagers he’d been looking for. Sophomores in high school, like he would have been if he wasn’t mostly schooled by private tutors hired by the Queen. He was missing his studies for this damn heist business, and almost missed the endless acting classes from his years before the Court, followed by tiresome back to back performances. At least acting brought him pleasure. Learning to shoot a gun or speak English were endlessly uninteresting to him.

“Do you go to the high school?”

Andrea jumped. He hadn’t realized he’d spaced out staring at the fountain. It was full of loose change, glinting copper under undulating water.

“I- No,” he said, and he decided to use his real accent. The girl was older than him, he thought, taller and more, um. Developed. She smiled at him, all braces and pretty green eyes. Her honey-brown hair was pin-straightened and maybe a little dull, but she was pretty enough. He smiled back at her, a little shyly. “I’m homeschooled.”

Her eyes lit up at his accent. Of course they did, American girls were easy to please like that. “Oh, where are you from?”

 _“_ _Roma,_ _”_ he replied, straightening up proudly. He wasn’t, but she wouldn’t recognize the name of his home anyway. “I’ve lived in California since I was eleven, though.”

“How come I’ve never seen you before? I’d definitely remember that face.”

He grinned, looked at his feet as if to hide a flush. “I, um. I’ve only lived in La Sierra for a while. I’ve never- I’ve never been here before.”

She smiled wide, holding out a hand, which he took gracefully. “I can show you around. I’m Sydney.”

“Ah, _grazie._ I’m Luca.” His middle name, just in case. Hazard hadn’t given him as much instruction as he would have preferred, so he decided to play it safe. Add in the gratuitous Italian, and he knew he’d have her eating out of his hand in no time.

When he came back into Hazard’s apartment, it was nearly eight. He and Sydney had wandered the mall for a long time. When they’d gotten hungry, she’d offered to buy dinner. He took the opportunity to ask her out to dinner, to pay her back. She’d blushed and accepted, gracefully, and he’d made sure to kiss her on both cheeks when he’d said goodbye (which was not the common practice in Italy, but she didn’t know that). He actually kind of liked her, and was a little worried about what Hazard was planning for their “date,” but he put it out of his mind.

\--

“Alright, so the biggest issue with you is keepin’ character under pressure, right?”

“I guess.”

“So, tell me who you are.”

“... What?”

“Who’re you playin’? I can’t tell you’re in character if I don’t know who your character is. Tell me about yourself, kid.”

“... I’m... Luca. Luca, uh, Russo.”

“Excuse me? Do you not know your own damn _name?”_

“I’m Luca Russo. I grew up in _Roma, Italia,_ with my parents and my young- no, older sister.”

“What’s her name?”

“Um- Martina.”

“How old is she?”

“Twenty-two.”

“And you?”

“Sixteen.”

“Alright. Uh, damn, what else- where do you live?”

“An... A suburb in _las afueras._ With my parents.”

“Do you go to school?”

“I’m homeschooled.”

“Why?”

“...”

“Well?”

“I... I didn’t learn English until very recently.”

“What, really?”

“Are you asking Luca or Andrea?”

“Andrea.”

“Yes. I still take lessons with Her Majesty, the Queen. I speak much better than I write.”

“The Queen gives you _personal lessons?”_

“She gives me my speaking lessons. It’s mostly idiomatic phrases, figures of speech, and other vernacular at this point, though.” A pause. “How is this relevant to my character?”

“Oh, shit. Right. Uh... Favorite color?”

“...? Red?”

“What school subjects do you like?”

“Uh, math. And theatre.”

“Why?”

“Math is the same in Italian and English, and theatre is fun.”

“Do you have a criminal record?”

“Hazard-”

_“Luca.”_

“No. I’m a good kid.”

“Hobbies?”

“Acting. Uh, video games. Maybe I can draw?”

“‘Maybe?’”

“I can sort-of draw. I’m not as good as- I-I mean I- I’m not that good.”

“Anything else you can think of?”

“No, sir.”

“Then, uh. Dismissed.”

“Oh. Alright.” Another pause. “Can I ask you a question?”

“No.”

“O-oh. Sorry, sir.”

“... What’s your question?”

“Um... what’s your favorite color?”

"Really?"

"I'm curious, now."

“Yellow.”

“I should’ve guessed.”

“Honestly. Anythin’ else?”

“I- What are you going to...  _do_ on Saturday?”

A laugh. “And ruin the surprise? You can wait.”

“... Yes, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate titles were "Yes, sir." and "I really gotta stop day drinking." I like this chapter, quotes wise. Probably explains the whole dialogue-only second half.
> 
> If the second half is annoying or confusing, let me know and I can add dialogue tags. I kind of like it as it is but, as always, I'm open to feedback.
> 
> Next chapter we get back to the violence. Thank god.


	6. "And you, darlin'?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andrea goes on a date. Hazard interrupts.

Saturday came faster than Andrea would have preferred.

He wasn’t scared, per se, at least not yet, but he was nervous. His hands shook while he got dressed that evening, Hazard watching him from the kitchen table. The older man was dressed up like, well, like himself – but like Hazard, not the casual guy in the ski-mask Andrea had become used to. Tight, dark blue jeans and a black t-shirt, a shiny leather jacket and black cowboy boots, the tape that was his namesake wrapped around his palms and head, only leaving a gap for the bottom of his nose and another for his baby blues. Andrea swallowed down as much of his anxiety as he could, but he felt over-dressed and too-hot under the collar.

He didn’t look at Hazard too much, no matter how his hormonal brain wanted to analyze the width of his shoulders and the long stretch of his legs. Hazard was a terrorist, a mindless killer. Hazard was an enemy of the Court, and an enemy of Andrea’s, forced assistance be damned.

La Montagne Cachéey was a twenty minute walk if you knew the way, so it took Andrea a little over half an hour to find his way to its earthy brown velvet overhangs and gilded calligraphy. It was as hard to notice amongst its more ostentatious neighbors as a place called “The Hidden Mountain” was probably meant to be.

“Luca! I was beginning to think you’d forgotten about me!” Sydney said. She was leant up against the brick pillar that separated the glass door from the window, her hair still over-straightened, but with more makeup. She was wearing a coral dress that stopped a little more than halfway down her thigh and made her shaved-below-the-knee legs look that much longer than they were. Add that to the heels, she was a couple inches taller than Andrea was, and more eye-catching. Andrea smiled at her, brightly.

“How could I forget that face?” he said, twisting what she’d said after they met, and she blushed a little. He extended his elbow to her and she took it, delicately, with a flirty smile that made Andrea’s chest bloom with guilt. What was going to happen to this girl when Hazard showed up?

He refused to think about it while they got settled. He refused to think about it while he kept his character intact, and while they ordered their dinner. He refused to think about it, he really did, but every time the bell above the door would gently tinkle he would clench his fist in the table cloth.

“Are you okay, Luca?” Sydney asked, cutting off the mildly humorous anecdote Andrea hadn’t been listening to her tell. “You’re shaking all over.”

He gave a nervous laugh, and grinned, trying for sheepish. “I’m, ah- Sorry, I’m just nervous.”

She smiled back at him, warmly. God, she was so sweet and so nice. His stomach twisted up into a knot and he felt nauseous.

Then there was a gunshot and the door behind him shattered.

“Everybody get the FUCK out!” Hazard boomed, and all the color drained from Andrea’s face. He bolted up out of his seat while the restaurant erupted into chaos, everyone rushing for the exits and their cell phones and each other. Sydney screamed and Andrea grabbed her hand, making for the door, half trying to blend in with the terrified masses and half actually terrified.

“Not so quick, buddy.” Hazard grabbed his shoulder when he tried to rush past, and Sydney squeezed his hand hard. Andrea felt real fear like a small animal tearing at his stomach, wishing he could run away. “You and your little girlfriend are gonna sit right back down.”

“Luca, let’s go!” Sydney exclaimed and she tried to push past, pulling Andrea’s hand, and his heart jumped up into his throat when Hazard pointed his gun at her.

“Sit. The fuck. Down.”

Andrea nodded quickly, swallowing, and caught Sydney’s eyes. He nodded again. _Just comply. Maybe he won_ _’_ _t hurt us._ He put up his free hand as if in surrender, and with the other he pulled Sydney back to their table. He was reluctant to drop her hand, but he did once they were both seated.

Hazard approached, and began to circle their table, slowly, like a vulture. Andrea couldn’t decide if he wanted to watch him closely, or if he wanted to watch Sydney, or if he wanted to stare at the table and wish this was over already. His heart was pounding harder and faster than it ever had before. Sydney was hyperventilating, hands knotted up in her lap. She kept glancing between them and Andrea, seeking comfort. He half-smiled at her, trying for reassuring and failing. All at once he was hit by a wave of hatred – for Hazard, for the Court, for his miserable excuse for a life. Acting, lying, deceiving, all were something he could deal with. Scamming and conning and all didn’t feel near as bad as putting this innocent girl in real, physical danger.

“So, ah, how old’re y’all?” Hazard asked, casually, inspecting his pistol with interest.

“S-sixteen,” Andrea said, only half faking the stutter. Sydney nodded hard, hair shaking.

“M-me too,” she said, lying. She’d told Andrea she was a year older. He didn’t blame her for the white lie – she sounded like she was about to cry. Less syllables. Less thinking.

“And where do y’all go to school?”

Andrea felt sick listening to Hazard, the older man’s voice so confident and unaffected. He waited to see if Sydney would answer first, but she didn’t, so he spoke up. “I’m- I’m homeschooled.”

Sydney didn’t say anything, and Hazard stopped moving to stand at her side. “Li’l girl, I asked you a question.”

She swallowed thickly, and inhaled like it hurt to do so. “I g-go t-t-to the, um, to La Si- La Sierra High.”

Hazard resumed walking, and Sydney dropped her shoulders like she’d just passed off Atlas’s burden.

“And what are your names?” he asked, finally stopping behind Andrea’s shoulder to look only at Sydney. Andrea watched her just as closely, but kept himself braced for whatever Hazard was about to do.

“An- Luca,” Andrea caught himself, and Hazard exhaled quickly out his nose, a half-laugh that made Andrea flush red. He’d nearly dropped character, damn it. He cursed himself.

“And you, darlin’?”

“M-my name’s Syd-”

She was cut off when Hazard put a bullet between her eyes. Andrea’s breath caught in his throat and for a split second the world seemed to be spinning without him, and then his eyes began to sting, throat burning like he’d pounded a shot of molten glass. He screamed, scrambling to his feet, but in his rush he just knocked over his chair and fell, twisting one of his legs between those of his seat.

“Sorry, didn’t actually care,” Hazard said quietly, like he was thinking aloud, and Andrea wasn’t meant to hear what he’d said. He wished he hadn’t.

Somehow the police hadn’t arrived yet, despite the probably thirty calls they’d gotten when Hazard showed up. Andrea sobbed, face turned down into the lush emerald carpet and knees pulled up under him, too overwhelmed with shock and terror to move. Hazard nudged his shoe with his own.

“Kid, get the fuck up, we gotta go,” he said, and his voice was edged with obvious annoyance. “You can be a fucking baby when we’re back at my place.”

Shaking deep down to his convulsing core, Andrea took several deep breaths much faster than he meant to and drew himself up. His legs felt like they were made of jelly and his stomach muscles jumped and shook with sobs he couldn’t control.  He- he couldn't help but look over his shoulder, at- And she was crumpled over, face down and staining the white tablecloth scarlet. He'd read before that it was possible to- to  _survive_ a gunshot wound to the head.

Sydney wasn't so lucky, though. She'd been doomed since Andrea had said hello.

Hazard grabbed his bicep and dragged him toward the back, growling and grumbling all the way. Andrea didn’t notice. He could smell blood, thick and cloying in his nostrils, and he dry heaved a couple times.

The both of them ran for what felt like hours through back ways and alleys until they were back behind that old pawn shop. Andrea swiped at his face with two shaking hands and clenched his eyes shut before Hazard could order him to. Instead of receiving the command, however, he received a solid slap, right across his face. He cried out in shock.

“Open your goddamn eyes and look at my face,” Hazard growled, grabbing Andrea by the front of his burgundy button down. Andrea complied, and found blue eyes and black-and-yellow tape much closer than anticipated. He felt Hazard’s breath on his mouth. “That shit back there? I know you’re scared, kid, believe me, but if you fucking fall apart like that one more goddamn time, fuck your whore of a Queen, I will put a bullet behind your eyes before you can fuckin’ shut ‘em. Understood?”

Andrea nodded so hard he felt like his neck was going to snap. When Hazard told him to close his eyes, he did, and he allowed himself to be led back to the apartment.

\--

The second he had his ski-mask on, Kris rounded on Andrea.

“Now, are you gonna explain what the fuck that was, or are you gonna cry some more?” he asked, fists clenched at his side. He wanted desperately to hit Andrea again, but he was pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to maim the kid, just traumatize him. It seems he’d done his job _too_ well. Andrea was staring at his hands like he’d been the one that had pulled the damned trigger.

“I’m- I’m sorry, Hazard,” he said, voice small and pitiful. He didn’t look up at him. Kris barked a mirthless laugh.

“Oh! That makes it okay, thanks so much, you shitty little brat!” Maybe he sounded a little hysterical, but he didn’t care. “You’ve been with the Court for, what, months? Years? This shit shouldn’t be so fuckin’ new to you! Ya ain’t ever seen none of that mafia shit back in Italy?!”

Something in Andrea seemed to snap apart at that, and he looked up at Kris with fire in his eyes. “Back in Italy? In Italy I was _eleven!_ And I lived in a fucking orphanage with a bunch of- I was raised by _nuns!_ I hadn’t seen an illegal thing in my entire life until some crazy-entitled Spaniard bought me!” He was hysterical, gesturing emphatically and shouting. He shook his head in disbelief. “Bought me like property. Didn’t adopt me, didn’t fill out any paperwork, didn’t even meet me beforehand! He heard about the pretty little acting prodigy out in the middle of nowhere, Italy and coughed up enough euro to make the sisters go cross-eyed!” His face was tomato red and he was glaring up at Kris with real hatred; his throat sounded tight. He started to pace. “He brought me here and I slept in a closet for four years, in between grueling acting classes and back to back performances, learning the lines for three plays at once. Of all the ways he wanted to make money off me, he wanted to get me into Hollywood, make me famous! At least he wasn’t renting me out like a toy, and I was supposed to be grateful for that!” It was Andrea’s turn to laugh, mirthlessly, with an empty look in his shining brown eyes when he tore them from Kris’s like he couldn’t stand to look at him another goddamned second. “Then, two years ago, in the middle of a show, he disappeared from the crowd and Ca- _Wrecker_ met me outside. The Queen had taken me off his hands! She bought me from him! Like property, _again!_ _”_ He turned his glare back on Kris with an intensity that almost made him flinch. “So I mean, I’m fucking _sorry_ if I can’t watch you murder some poor, sweet girl without having an emotional response! And I’m _sorry_ I can’t keep character when I’m terrified, and I’m _sorry_ I can’t keep myself together when I’m legitimately in fear for my life! I didn’t ask for this- this _horseshit,_ okay!? I didn’t ask for this! I’m _sixteen,_ Hazard! For Christ’s sake!”

Tirade over, Andrea heaved for a moment, then his shoulders fell like he was a puppet and his strings had been cut. He looked at Kris for a moment longer, expression softening, then looked away, swiping stray tears from his cheeks. He’d heaved a couple suitcases up the stairs into the apartment the other night, and now they were up against the wall by the TV stand. He looked toward them, then went to ruffle through them. “I’m going to take a shower,” he said, quiet, emotionless. His voice was hoarse.

Kris watched him gather his things and lock the bathroom door behind him, ass leant back up against the edge of the kitchen table. He was still pissed off that the kid had made him wait so long before he could leave the damn restaurant. Maybe Andrea hadn’t been able to hear over his whining, but the police sirens had been loud as bells in Kris’s ears when he was trying to peel the kid off the floor. Yeah, the other kid – whatever her name had been – was probably a perfectly sweet girl. But sweet didn’t matter to Kris, and it especially didn’t matter to Hazard. Same went for Andrea. No matter how heart-wrenching a sob story he had, if he fucked up again, Kris would keep true to his word, prison be damned. If the kid was so fucked up over his past, he’d get away from it, and he’d let it go.

It'd worked out well enough for Kris.


	7. "With a 'K.'"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris gets hurt and Andrea helps him out.

“Fuck, I should really-” Kris cringed, taking one hand off the wheel of the stolen car to clutch at the wound in his side. Years and years of living in La Sierra without a single shot, now two within three weeks of each other? It was _bullshit._  “-invest in a vest, or somethin’.”

It was midday, a bright and beautiful Sunday afternoon, and on top of that, Kris had the day off from work. He hadn’t done anything with Andrea since the restaurant thing, and honestly he was scared to try. Andrea was the opposite of hardened after the experience, flinching hard whenever Kris so much as walked into the room (which was frustrating, seeing as the whole apartment was one room, and all). Still more, when Kris had tried to talk to him to at least get rid of some of the silence, Andrea had turned him down (politely, so politely, but Kris still wanted to hit him again).

So, frustrated and a little pissed off, Kris had decided to go out and have a little fun.

And here he was.

He couldn’t figure out how to work the stereo, mashing buttons at random as he veered hard around a car parked on the side of the road. He hadn’t worn his tape under the heat of the sun in a while, and he was starting to realize there was a good reason for that while sweat pooled between plastic and skin. The AC wasn’t as complicated, but as tightly bound as he was, it only made his eyes and fingers cold. He blinked fast to dispel the numbness.

He didn’t think he was losing blood _too_ fast, at least. It hurt like a motherfucker, but he could still feel his extremities, and his head was mostly clear. Outside he could hear sirens, though whether they were right behind him or across town, he couldn't tell. Maybe he _was_ losing blood pretty fast.

He swerved around another corner and another, running a red light and barely missing an ugly white SUV. Its owner honked at him and he leaned hard against the horn on his own car, whatever it was. He’d just grabbed whatever was biggest without really looking at the make and model. It didn’t matter to him – he’d never been a car guy, and the horn was loud and deep, so he was okay with his non-decision.

Though the police would be a problem. The thing refused to top seventy, and that was fine from a point-A-to-point-B standpoint, but as far as high speed chases went, it missed out on the most important aspect: the speed. Mostly he was just trying to be as nimble as he could, serpentine and cutting corners while he mostly avoided cars. Motorcyclists were fair game, though .The way they flew halfway across the median when he hit them was hilarious. He just couldn’t help himself.

Driving had never been a hobby of Kris’s, and in the three years since he’d learned how, well. He could count how many times he’d actually driven on his fingers. It didn’t come back like riding a bike supposedly did, more buttons and switches than muscle memory could remind him of. It didn't help that he learned late, or that he'd been... well, kind of distracted during his lessons.

(He wondered what Alex was up to, nowadays. Did he still want Kris dead?)

The back window shattered, frustrated rage shoving that thought out of his head. If he got shot again he was gonna be _pissed._

He took another two rights in rapid succession, the tape of his hands slick with sweat and making turning the wheel that much harder. Around the corner he saw some guy getting into a car, some tiny, boring silver thing parked on the side of the road, and without thinking about it, he slammed his foot down on the gas and went straight at the car.

Kris remembered belatedly that he was in a pickup, and realized that the car was pretty small. The car’s owner screamed himself hoarse as the truck sent the smaller vehicle skidding back, though not without crushing the front into an accordion and shattering just about every window from sheer force of impact alone. Kris whooped in excitement when the cab screeched its way up over the windshield, but then everything seemed to go still, like a moment of calm before the storm.

Then the silver car’s fuel tank exploded.

For a moment all Kris could hear and see was white and the shattering of glass, splintering metal and otherworldly screeching of steel on asphalt, and he shouted as the front of the pickup was shot up and over, landing heavily on the passenger door in the middle of the street. Everything blacked out for a second, or maybe longer, while Kris tried to remember how to breathe. He fumbled with the seatbelt with trembling hands and fell into the small pool of blood and shattered glass when he finally got it to release. The driver window was down, another try at ventilating the sweltering cab that he’d taken when he’d been vertical, and with a little trouble Kris managed to stand and pull himself up and out of the hole, slicing up his hands and the sleeves of his jacket on fucked up metal and glass in the process.

“Freeze, Hazard!” some policeman shouted while Kris got to his feet on top of the car door, wobbly and tall, head throbbing. He couldn’t hear the man through the ringing in his ears, but he could see the makeshift barricade the cops had made on the corner. Four or five cruisers were lined up with their doors open as cover, officers aiming at him but not shooting. Kris sneered at the less-than-welcoming display.

“I can’t hear you, if y’all’re yellin’ at me, which ya prob’ly are,” he shouted back, while he clumsily climbed down from the pickup. “But, uh, if y’all could excuse me-”

He sprinted past the smoldering remains of the car and saw that, somehow, its owner was trapped under it and bleeding profusely from a leg wound. _Exciting._ Gunshots followed him until he passed between two buildings. He was still bleeding from his side and it ached like a cramp cranked up to eleven, but he didn’t dare stop. He had to- he had to get home, he had to get the tape off, _oh god._ It had melted in the insufferable heat blast from the explosion and was sticking to his skin around his eyes, nose, and neck. Fuck, why had he thought the tape would be cool, two years ago in a Home Depot when he bought the damn roll? All it did was make everything complicated and give him a nickname.

The two-week old bullet wound in his leg decided that now was a great time to come back to haunt him, and Kris cursed under his breath when the whole leg gave out and he tripped over himself, shredding up the tape on his hands and the skin underneath when he hit the pavement. Then he cursed aloud, then he screamed obscenities for a moment, nearly tearing off his tape in frustration. He couldn’t fucking breathe, sucking in half-mouthfuls of dirty air before the plastic sealed his mouth shut. He hyperventilated out of necessity and, ears still ringing and body still bleeding from more places than he could think of, he pulled himself to his feet and kept running.

When he got to the alley by his apartment, he wasn’t alone, and was furious to find himself that way.

“Get out,” he growled, mouth full of blood and spit he couldn’t swallow.

The intruder was maybe his own age, mid-twenties with sleeve tattoos and a pierced eyebrow. She took a pull on a cigarette and cringed at the taste, looking him up and down with a look of disinterest he’d never gotten before, as Hazard. Her hair was bright red. “Nah, I’m good here.”

Kris snarled, but she couldn’t see that. Fucking tape. She could see his glare, though, he was sure. “You feelin’ fuckin’ brave?” he asked, voice wavering in strength. His eyesight was drifting in and out, rimmed in black. He reached for his pistol, but it wasn’t there. Fuck. He must have lost it in the crash.

“You don’t look so hot,” she said, dragging on her cigarette. “So I’m not scared of you. Not right now.”

Kris growled, or roared, or just fucking whined, but whichever way, he made a loud noise and went at her. He broke the hinge of her glasses with his first punch, and grabbed her throat with the other, holding her up against the brick wall. Her eyes went wide, green and ringed in smudged black eyeliner. His first instinct was to head-butt her, but his head throbbed in a reminder that that was probably a bad idea. Instead he lifted her short frame up to eye level and cracked her skull up against the bricks, glaring hard into her eyes.

Her mouth, open in shock, screwed up in focus and she brought a knee up to get him hard in the stomach, a heavy combat boot catching him in the groin almost on accident. He dropped her and groaned, doubling over enough that she could bring her other foot up to catch him in the mouth, sending him reeling to the ground. She dropped her smoldering cigarette a foot away from his face and sprinted down the street. More blood pooled in his mouth, but he could hear harried footsteps and police sirens. Clawing his way up the wall and breaking the skin of his knuckles and fingertips in the process, he drew himself painfully slowly to his feet. His dick ached like nothing he’d felt in a long time but he didn’t have time to think too hard about it, stars dancing in his vision and pain replacing every other sensation.

Going to the exit of the alley, tape still tied and disgustingly wet underneath, Kris forced himself to look both ways before limping as fast as he possibly could across the street. Some deity was either looking out for him or saving him for some much worse fate, because there wasn’t a soul around to see him stumble up the apartment steps and into his apartment, collapsing up against the back of the door with a heavy thud, breath coming faster and faster like he’d never breathe again.

-

The lights were out and the blinds were closed when the door slammed open and shut and Hazard collapsed up against it. His shirt was soaked with blood and his clothes were singed, reeking of sweat and burnt plastic even from across the room. Andrea was at his side in seconds, crouched, hands hovering but unsure what to do. He watched Hazard try to draw in a deep, gurgling breath, only for the tape to hollow out over his mouth and cut off the air supply.

“Ha- Hazard, I need to-” he gestured nonsensically toward the tape, but the older man’s eyes were screwed shut in pain. “I need to-”

“The tape, yeah,” Hazard gritted out, jaw clenched. “Get it- get it off o’ me.” Speaking sounded like it hurt him, and Andrea began to fumble with the plastic, manhandling Hazard’s head while he tried to find the end. It took him too long to find it, but when he finally did he began to unwrap as gently as he could, revealing at first only more tape, but then bleached blonde hair and tanned skin, an ear with a chunk cut out of it, sharp cheekbones and a smell like festering sweat. He had to yank hard to get melted plastic out of Hazard’s hair and off his skin as he revealed more and more of the man underneath. His thin lips were pale and split open, and when he finally began hissing in real breaths Andrea saw that his teeth were stained red with his own blood. Hazard turned his head to the side and spit out a mouthful of blood and bile before leaning his head back, deep-set eyes shut tight while he tried to regulate his breathing.

Andrea couldn’t do the same, staring wide-eyed at Hazard’s face with an uncomfortable tightness in his pants, breathing in shallow lungfuls of musk and blood and the distinctive chemical smoke of gasoline set on fire. Why the fuck was that turning him on? There was some sort of grime that laid in a thin layer, shining and gray on Hazard’s angular face that was equal parts disgusting and inexplicably attractive, to Andrea.

“First... first aid,” Hazard hissed out, clutching the bleeding wound in his side to try and stifle the bleeding. Andrea hadn’t even noticed it. “It’s- ha,  _shit-_  under the, uh. The bathroom sink.”

“R-right.” Andrea pulled himself to his feet and sped to the bathroom through the dark. The first aid kit was bigger and heavier than he’d anticipated, heavy-duty white plastic with a scuffed red cross on the front like something out of a video game. He grabbed it and, as an afterthought, wet a hand towel and brought that too. He tossed the towel at Hazard’s face while he flicked on the lights.

Hazard pulled off his shirt without prompting, and Andrea only ogled for a moment before getting to work. The burn scars all over his chest, shoulders, and back didn’t extend as far down as the bullet wound by his hipbone, but in some places they got close. His fingers, slick as they were in blood and fumbling with long tweezers trying to pluck out the lead where it was embedded deep inside Hazard’s side, itched and longed to trace the old injury. Andrea forced himself to focus, or at least look like he was focused.

He worked in silence, cleaning the wound and inspecting the rest of Hazard’s body for more, but he had gotten out of whatever the hell he’d gotten into relatively unscathed. Finally satisfied with his work, Andrea sat back on his haunches, and Hazard pulled himself up higher, still just trying to breathe.

“So, um, Hazard-” Andrea started, but Hazard held up a hand. His fingertips were bloody and torn up, too. What the hell had he  _done?_

“It’s Kris,” he said, and Andrea gaped. His real name? Hazard looked up into his eyes, the first eye contact since Andrea had uncovered his face. He looked naked, vulnerable. “You’ve seen my face. I’m not Hazard without the tape. It’s Kris. With a ‘K.’”

Andrea felt his face warm. “I- Alright, Kris. What happened?”

Kris broke a grin, teeth still bloody, and Andrea inexplicably yearned for the taste of copper on his tongue. “I, uh... I had a little fun. Crashed a car. Got beat up.”

“And that’s ‘fun’ to you?”

He shrugged. “Beats sittin’ ‘round here watchin’ you jump.”

Andrea didn’t respond. He looked at Kris’s face, making note of everything – the long, pointed nose, the light freckles high on his cheekbones, the scar on his jaw, the bags under his eyes – until the older man looked away. Then he started packing up the first aid kit.

When he came out of the bathroom after putting it away, Kris had a towel thrown over his shoulder and was waiting outside. About to take a shower.

“Thanks for fixin’ me up, kid,” he said, softly, and Andrea flushed a little, then nodded.

“Keep the bandage dry,” he recited, something he remembered from the series of first aid classes the Court had put him through. Kris nodded back and slid past him into the bathroom, locking the door behind him.

Alone in the studio, Andrea flung himself down onto the couch with a groan, willing his erection to subside.

That night he dreamed of blue eyes and blood and fire and fingertips that left a bloody trail on his skin, and woke up tomato red.


	8. "You say the nicest things."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris and Andrea have an outing.

“We’re gonna try somethin’ different this time.”

Andrea looked up at him. He’d guessed as much. They were out in public, Kris sans tape, walking somewhere Andrea didn’t know. He was twitchy, nervous – he only looked at Kris for a second before glancing around, checking out both sides of the street. For some reason, keeping Kris’s identity secret was important to him, like he’d been entrusted with a precious secret. If a member of the Court saw and recognized Andrea, it wouldn’t be hard to make the jump. No tape and no jacket, but Kris still looked like Hazard. He didn’t even use a different voice or speaking pattern, which seemed like it’d be an obvious choice to Andrea. Though maybe not everyone was a multi-lingual, multi-dialectal acting prodigy like he was. Sometimes he forgot he was exceptional.

“I’d assumed,” he admitted. “What for?”

Kris shrugged. “I thought it’d be better if we did somethin’ a little more, uh... hands-on. And I’m damn tired of bein’ shot.”

Andrea snickered. “I can imagine.” He gestured to the case slung across Kris’s back. “So I should guess there’s an actual guitar in there?” he asked, as though he didn't already know Kris was a musician. As though he hadn't gone through his (presumably private) songwriting notebook.

“O’ course.”

“And why?”

Kris shot him a smirk that made his chest tighten. “I play the first Thursday every month. It’s a thing.”

“You play?” He faked surprise.

Kris nodded. “Since I was your age. It’s the only damn thing I’m good at.”

“You’re good at having a complete disregard for human life,” Andrea said, flatly, and Kris barked a surprised laugh.

“Aw, kid, you say the nicest things.”

Their destination was an old bar, old-fashioned like something out of an old western, except it was filled with bikers and tired single mothers instead of dramatic outlaws, and there were more cigarette butts on the ground than sawdust. The sun was just setting outside when they left the finally-starting-to-get-cold mid-October air for the stuffy indoors.

“You’re late, Palmetto,” the bartender said, an older Latina woman with unflattering round glasses and dark lipstick. “I was ‘boutta turn on the jukebox.”

Kris smiled at her, charming as anyone, and Andrea could almost forget the way he’d put a hole in Sydney’s skull without allowing her to finish her sentence. “Sorry, Paloma. I’m here now, ain’t I?”

She fixed him with a stern look, but let it go, turning her gaze instead to Andrea. “And who’s the kid? He underage?”

Kris pulled a face, like he was humorously embarrassed, fake as his hair color. “My nephew, uh, Andrew. I’m babysittin’.”

“So you brought him to my bar?” Her mouth was pulled taught like she’d sucked on a lemon.

“Still gotta pay the bills, señora,” he replied, and Andrea thought she looked like she was gonna throw the bottle of Jack Daniels she was cradling at him, but instead she gestured toward the back with a flick of her head. There was a stage, poorly lit and unadorned but for a two headed microphone stand and a stool with uneven legs. Kris directed Andrea to the table closest by.

“So I’m your nephew?” Andrea asked. Kris shrugged.

“First thing I thought of,” he said, offhand. He glanced up at the stage like he itched to get up there, but he had to talk to Andrea first. “So we’re gonna start a bar fight.”

_“_ _What?_ _”_

Kris shushed his outburst, brow furrowing. “I’m hopin’ it’ll look accidental.” Kris went on, ignoring his question. “So just sit over here and look pretty. If someone comes over here and starts bein’ creepy, catch my eye. Ain’t nobody gon’ creep on my nephew, alright?”

“So you brought me here to get us beat up and kicked out.” Andrea tried to sound less than amused and like he wasn’t reeling a little about Kris calling him ‘pretty.’

“That’s the plan,” Kris admitted. “At least I won’t be the only one recoverin’.”

Andrea cracked a smile at that. “And if people keep their creepy hands to themselves?”

“I'll think of something else, but I dunno. I think our chances’re high.”

“Palmetto! On the stage! Now!” Paloma shouted from across the bar, and Kris shared a secretive nod with Andrea before slipping him something small and metal – a pocket knife, he realized – and deftly pulling himself up onto the stage.

Andrea slipped the weapon into his pocket, heart speeding up in anticipation.

The lights dimmed while Kris dragged the stool and mic stand to center stage and set up, checking the microphones and his guitar, an old acoustic thing that was covered in scratches and stickers and, in one spot, the letters “PCS” in sharpie, stricken through and followed by “KP.” There was polite applause from most of the bar, and some more enthusiastic fare from people who seemed to recognize him. Kris managed to smile shyly up through the spotlight, endearing and handsome despite the hollowing shadows over his eyes and under his cheekbones.

He wasn’t exceptionally talented a guitar player, his right hand clumsy and stumbling stiffly over the strings, but no one seemed to care – his voice was his selling point, slightly rough, his southern accent more charming than it had any right to be. His range was impressive, and Andrea wondered if he’d had any vocal training, or other musical history. The guitar case was open at the edge of the stage in front of Kris’s feet, and a giggling, drunk woman dropped a couple bills into it before skittering back to her friends. Kris grinned and winked at the whole table, which erupted into laughter over their red-faced friend.

Andrea watched Kris raptly the whole time he sang, song after song. Some were covers of stuff Andrea had heard on the radio or from Cam, singing off-key around their quarters back at the Court. A couple of them, however, were complete mysteries. Songs he’d just never heard of, or original compositions? Andrea was reminded of that notebook full of rhymes and guitar tabs that he'd found his first morning alone in Kris's apartment. Kris stumbled a bit more over those ones, pausing to go, “Ah, sorry,” in between lyrics. It was a strange thought – Kris bent over that yellow, spiral bound notebook, chewing on the end of a pencil and going over lyrics in his head, thoughtful and, for just a moment, creating something instead of destroying it.

“You here by yourself?”

Andrea jumped, wrenching his eyes from the figure on stage to look at the one leaning, unwelcome but not unexpected, on his table. He was closer to Kris’s age than his own, hair long and dark and pulled into a ponytail at the base of his neck, and was wearing a flannel over a black wife-beater and dark skinny jeans, half hipster and half white trash. Andrea tried not to sneer at the stench of old beer and tobacco on the guy’s breath.

“Excuse me?” he asked, American accent in place, as it had been since he left the apartment.

The guy leaned closer, smirking in a way he probably thought was attractive. “I was asking if you’re alone, pretty boy.”

He kept his face blank, masking his disgust. “And if I am?”

A casual smile angled away, maybe trying to seem nonchalant, but it felt too calculated, like he was trying to play Andrea. A predator, then. An actor challenging Andrea at his own game. If only he knew he was in over his head. “I’d, uh. I think I’d like to take ya out. Or at least buy you a drink.” A wink, nowhere near as potent as Kris’s had been. He smiled more directly at Andrea, and extended a hand. “The name’s Evan.”

Shoving down his revulsion and forcing himself to keep from glancing at Kris to see if he was watching what was going on, Andrea smiled back, more warmly than he probably needed to, but it did what it was meant to. Evan's eyes went a little unfocused looking at Andrea’s mouth. “I’m Andrew. It’s great to meet you, but I’ll have to turn down the drink. I’m not twenty-one.”

Evan kept smiling, somehow more shadily than before, like he thought he was about to make Andrea’s goddamn day. “I won’t tell anybody if you won’t.” He winked again, and Andrea almost wanted to laugh at him, when the music stopped all of a sudden.

“Hey, creep, what’re ya talkin’ to my nephew for?” Kris asked, loudly enough to be picked up by the mic while he set his guitar down on top of the tips he’d amassed over the past hour and a half.

Evan whirled around to watch Kris jump down off the stage. He put his hands up, eyes going wide when he realized who he’d pissed off. Kris was wearing a tight white t-shirt that left none of his muscles to the imagination, and exposed a great deal of the burn scars on his upper arms and neck, and all of that was glaring him down, cracking his knuckles like a bully from a cartoon. His smug expression dissolved into an apologetic smile fast as anything.

“Oh, shit, man, I didn’t mean-”

“Y’know he’s sixteen?” Kris growled, getting too close for comfort, glaring the sleazebag down. “That’s fucked up, man.”

“I was just talking to him!” Evan said, and Andrea clicked his tongue.

“Yeah, Uncle Kris, we were just talking,” he said, faux-innocent. He could feel the laugh bubbling up in his throat at the sheer terror in Evan's eyes. What a disgusting waste of space. “He said he was gonna buy me a drink.”

“Y-yeah, like a Coke or somethin’!”

Kris laughed, low and dangerous like thunder, or the rumble of an active volcano, volatile and unpredictable. Andrea shifted in his seat. “Somehow, I don’t believe a goddamn word you say, shitstain.” He shoved Evan lightly with both hands, but still he stumbled into the tall table, making it wobble dangerously.

“Palmetto, you calm that shit down or you can take it outside!” Paloma threatened, but either Kris couldn’t hear her or he ignored her ‘cause next thing Andrea knew, Kris was decking Evan across the face and sending him onto his back.

“Yo, what the fuck’s wrong with you?” Some of Evan's drinking buddies belatedly showed up to the party, leaving their glass-covered table behind to stumble over. A couple of them were huge, looming over Kris while he glared down at their friend.

“I don’t like creeps buggin’ my nephew, ‘s what,” he said, grabbing an empty glass from a nearby table and hurling it at one of the guys’ faces.

Five minutes later, with an almost artful progression, Kris had transformed the calm Thursday evening into an all-out brawl. At Kris’s prompting, Andrea had jumped in and found himself tangling with one of the bigger bikers, who seemed to be more into this for the adrenaline than any real reason to fight. Andrea tried to remember his training – long hours spent going over techniques and getting his ass handed to him by Park, by Cam, by JC – but by the time he’d figured out what would probably be a good idea he was already on the ground. A solid fist the size of his head went for his face and knocked him, hard, head snapping to the side and cracking against the wood floor. Then he remembered the pocket knife in his pocket. Stabbing the guy felt like an overreaction, but it was the best plan he had (especially when he got the other fist on the other side of his face, and the guy’s wedding band or class ring or whatever it was tore his skin up in its path).

Andrea fumbled in his pants pocket to retrieve the silver pod and, while trying to maybe get a knee up into the man’s groin, he flipped it open. The blade was short and sharp when he felt it up, slicing his thumb open with a sensation like fire. He gripped the handle hard and struggled a little, jostling the man enough to get his arm up and stick the three inch blade up under his denim jacket and through his sweat stained white shirt. The guy convulsed a little, startled, and sucked in a breath. He glared down at Andrea in surprise.

“Little shit just fuckin’ stabbed me!” he shouted to the bar at large. “Brought a fuckin’ knife to a fist fight!”

There was a commotion, and then he was kicked off Andrea onto his side, and then Andrea was being hoisted up by his wrist, his shoulder popping painfully. It was Kris, his white shirt bloodstained, but Andrea had a feeling the blood wasn’t his own. He smiled lopsidedly down at Andrea, teeth stained red once again.

“Ready to go?” he asked, somehow genuinely casual, and Andrea found himself unable to speak. His attacker (or maybe his victim, now) was pulling himself slowly to his feet, though, so Andrea forced himself to nod, maybe a little too eagerly. Kris laughed, grabbing him by the elbow and starting to weave his way past the violence and toward the back. His mood was contagious, and Andrea found he was smiling, further tearing the split in his lip he hadn’t even noticed before.

"Sorry, Paloma!" Kris shouted over his shoulder as he left the bar, and she glared at him, talking on the landline behind the bar with a look like this was a disappointment more than a surprise.

Through the kitchen and back door into the back alley, they kept running – Andrea could hear shouting behind them and he was understandably eager to get the fuck out of there – past garbage cans and people passed out in gutters, over fences and through shitty dirt patches somebody called their backyard, and even through the back and out the front of a family restaurant, unauthentic Italian cuisine assaulting Andrea’s nose like a personal insult.

When, several minutes later, they finally got back to the apartment, they were wheezing, bent over and clutching at themselves. Andrea noticed Kris had somehow managed to grab his guitar case in the commotion, and something about it made his grin break into a laugh, and he wrapped his arms around his stomach. Kris looked over at him and started laughing too, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, warm and solid and welcome. Now leaning all over each other, Andrea was laughing so hard he couldn’t breathe, inexplicably, like there was no other way he could pull air into his straining, aching lungs.

Kris forced a couple deep breaths, straightening but unable to wipe the grin off his face. He stank like blood and beer and sweat and garbage, and Andrea gave into an impulse and wrapped his arms around his chest, burying his face into the crook of his shoulder. His hands were shaking and now that his laughter was fading, he realized he was actually trembling all over. The adrenaline was wearing off, and he was scared.

What if he had killed that man? He could have, if he aimed his knife little higher, if he attacked a little faster. His throat closed up and Christ, he still couldn’t breathe, he felt like he was drowning, forcing great lungfuls of Kris’s air in through his nose.

“You did great, kid,” Kris said, so softly Andrea almost didn’t hear him over the heavy pounding of his heart in his stomach, echoing, reverberating throughout his middle. When strong arms hesitantly lifted to hold him right back, he had to resist a shiver.


	9. "It is now."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The end of the line draws nearer, no matter how Kris and Andrea may wish it wouldn't.

The last few weeks before the heist are almost fun, the more Andrea became desensitized to the shit Kris pulled. A couple times he’d put on the tape and let Andrea pull on the ski-mask to come along on the bigger stuff. Andrea, more and more, seemed to care less about the violence, willing to follow Kris anywhere without complaint. By late November, he wasn’t even trembling afterwards. At least, not that Kris could see.

Kris was doing his job of scaring Andrea tough as well as anyone could, or maybe better. He was getting a better sense of why they wanted him for the job, now – everything the Court did was calculated and painstakingly planned, or at least done with a pattern, so exposing Andrea to senseless violence would've been more difficult if he had been assigned to a Court member. Hazard was unknown, unusually lucky at evading police capture, and followed no pattern. Throwing in a temporary partner would help Kris out in the long run, making him seem even more unpredictable, while it would expose Andrea to the situations he needed to be the hardened criminal they wanted him to be. It was strange to imagine Andrea as anything but a scared kid, but he was a talented actor, and whatever fear he couldn’t stuff down and bottle up, Kris was sure he could at least hide.

So no, the situation was great. The radio silence from the Court was disconcerting and a little worrying, but nothing Kris was willing to worry about. Nothing he could do about it anyway.

“Do you think they forgot about me?” Andrea asked. It was late evening on the 26th of November, four days before the heist, and they were sat in front of the TV playing some cooperative puzzle game. Andrea was sat on the couch and Kris had his shoulder pressed against the kid’s knee. They hadn’t spoken in hours. Kris shrugged.

“I don’t think they would’a,” he replied. “What, you desperate to go home?”

Kris felt him shake when he shook his head the negative. “No, I just... some of them are my friends. I consider them family. And I miss them.”

Kris couldn’t imagine missing his family, but he nodded anyway. “I feel ya. It’ll be fine.”

“Do you ever see your family?” _Damn._ The kid always seemed to know which question Kris definitely didn’t want to answer.

“No,” he said simply. “They live on the other side of the country.”

“Oh.” Andrea paused, thoughtful while he solved the back end of the puzzle they were working on. “Do you miss them?” There it was. Kris barked a laugh.

“Not in a million years, kid. Even if they wanted to find me - which they don't - they don't know my new name.”

“Kris isn’t your real name?”

“It is now.”

They fell back into silence, companionable, comfortable, Andrea as thoughtful as always. It was late, nearly midnight, and Kris felt for the first time in a long time a sense of... of loneliness, almost. He hadn’t had reliable company in years, and the thought of going back to his empty apartment made his stomach twist up. He wouldn’t admit it, but he had come to like Andrea. He felt a protective urge over him, despite throwing him into danger the way he did, like he'd felt about his little sisters back home.

He looked up at Andrea for a moment, dark face thrown into relief by the too-bright TV screen. No, that wasn’t home. Insults and violence and hatred in the state he’d renamed himself after weren’t home. This was, here.

Midnight struck and his alarm clock beeped once to acknowledge the hour, and Kris refused to think about how, a week from now, Andrea would be gone, and he would be alone again.

\--

“Wrecker is outside.”

“What?” Kris rushed over to look out the window at what Andrea was- Wrecker was stood on the street corner in a green hoodie, hood thrown down, staring up at the building. When she turned her head, scanning the wall of identical windows, one of her piercings glinted in the grayish light filtering through the clouds. “How does she know where I live?!”

“I told them the building so they could bring me my clothes,” Andrea explained. “They don’t know which apartment we’re in.”

“They?” First Park, now Wrecker. Kris really needed to stop gendering strangers, Christ.

Andrea looked uneasy for a second, then nodded. “Yeah, they’re nonbinary. That means-”

Kris waved him off. “I know what it means.”

The kid’s eyes went wide, like he didn’t expect that. Kris still hadn’t gone into detail about his own past, not the way Andrea had, that night after Kris had killed his little friend. He hadn’t told anyone about his gender since he’d told his family. The Court seemed different, but he wasn’t a part of the Court. He passed as cis, he’d live as cis. Ignoring his gender hurt less the less he thought about it. It wasn’t important anyway.

“Go see what they want,” he ordered, and Andrea nodded, shrugging on a hoodie and leaving. Kris listened while he stomped down the metal steps and watched him once he hit the sidewalk. Andrea and Wrecker spoke with a friendly familiarity that Kris envied a little, though he recognized that they had probably known each other longer. Maybe, given enough time, he would've reach that level of familiarity with Andrea, but that time was rapidly coming to a close. The heist was supposed to be in three days.

They spoke below for several minutes, Kris watching aptly, until Wrecker said something that had Andrea freeze, tense up. She- _they_ didn’t stop, and eventually Andrea nodded, stiffly, and turned to take the stairs back up.

“They say we need to go to the Court, immediately,” Andrea said, noticeably more sullen while he closed the door behind him. “You need to tape up.”

“What’s wrong?” Kris asked, going for his safe and pulling out the roll of hazard tape.

Andrea shrugged. “They- Something Wrecker said bothered me.”

“What was it?”

He didn’t reply for a long time, and glanced out the window to watch his friend while Kris changed into darker jeans, and wrapped up his palms and his wrists in tape. Kris was beginning to think Andrea wasn’t gonna answer, but then he continued.

“I, um. I asked them if- if maybe, after the heist, I could, um.” He spoke slowly, as if afraid he would misspeak. “I could still see you, sometimes. And- I guess I forgot that you're the enemy. They said no.”

Wrapping his head took considerably longer than his hands did, and Kris began the long process, sat on the edge of his bed. “Why would you wanna stay _here?_ I can’t imagine sleepin’ on my couch for three months was all that comfortable.”

Andrea cracked a smile, and though his eyes were still downturned and sad, Kris put it down as a victory. “That it wasn’t. But it was-” His voice cracked, choked off. Kris patted the spot on his bed next to him, and after a long moment, Andrea joined him. “It was...”

“I’m gonna miss ya, kid,” Kris said, honestly, head half wrapped. “I ain’t had company in a long time and you wasn’t a bad partner in crime.” He chuckled softly. “The Court’ll be lucky to have ya back. And I’m sure as damn well ready to stop dealin’ with-”

He cut himself off at the look on Andrea’s face, biting his lip and looking at Kris’s mouth. The kid seemed to resign himself and leant forward, closing his eyes. Kris’s heart rate jumped way up and so did he, launching himself to his feet the moment their noses touched.

“I- _No,_ Andrea. No,” he said, gesturing emphatically with the hand that wasn’t holding the roll of tape up by his head. “No. Eleven years older than you, no.” He shook his own head, wiping at his dry mouth with the back of his free hand.

Andrea’s eyes widened and he flushed, embarrassment overtaking his features. “Oh, oh! I- I’m sorry, that was- That was uncalled for, I just-” His eyes watered up, and though most of the time Kris could forget he was just a kid, it was hard when he was about to cry. “I- I’m sorry. I wanted to- I wanted to tell you in c-case we didn’t- in case we didn’t see each other again, but I couldn’t figure out h-how to say it, so I just- I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He stood and stepped back several paces, wiping the moisture from his face.

Kris felt his own face warm. He sat back down. “Kid- Andrea, I’m flattered,” he said, finishing up wrapping his head. He reached into his closet and tugged his leather jacket from its hanger, still singed and stained from the months previous. “But you’re sixteen. I’m twenty-seven. That’s fucked up.”

“And if I wasn’t sixteen?”

“I dunno, kid,” Kris shrugged, pulling on the jacket. “But you are. And I’m not interested.” He ran a hand all over his head, making sure none of his hair was poking through the tape. He looked over at the kid and his chest got a little tight at his expression, somehow hopeful and devastated at the same time. “Get your shit, we’re leaving.”

\--

Outside, Kris shoved his hands in his pockets to pull his jacket tighter around himself against the chilly autumn air. The sky was overcast and gray, hanging low and dark with moisture despite being only mid-afternoon. The street was deserted, like it usually was. Something about this part of town made it feel like a ghost town, silent and unmoving like a corpse.

“Hey Andy, Haz,” Wrecker said, saluting with three fingers. “Follow me.”

They led Kris and Andrea down the street a good ways to a black unmarked van, opening the passenger door and ushering Andrea inside.

“Where’s J- Bandit? And where’s Hazard sitting?” the kid asked, looking around the cab. There were only two seats, and a wall behind them blocking off the back of the van.

“The back.” Wrecker walked around back and pulled open the doors. There were no windows back there, empty and dark, and they tossed Andrea's bag inside. They stepped back, waiting expectantly for Kris to climb inside. “He’s not allowed to know where we’re going. Plus, it’s sound-proofed, so you an’ me can talk.”

“I don’t-”

“It’s cool, I get it,” Kris cut Andrea off, and climbed into the back of the van. Wrecker didn’t look at him before slamming the doors and leaving him in complete silence.

The ride was long and, after a short stretch in the city, bumpy as all hell. Kris couldn’t tell if they were off road or just on some really shitty roads, but either way, he was carsick within half an hour. He tried leaning up against the walls, or lying on his back, or even sitting on all fours, but no way was comfortable, and he slid hard to the side with every turn and change in speed. Up ahead he was sure Wrecker and Andrea were talking about him, but the walls were as sound-proofed as they said, and only occasionally he could hear a burst of sound - a shout, a bark of laughter. Mostly he just heard the rumble of the ground below and his own breathing in the claustrophobic silence.

Finally, after what could have been anywhere between one hour and five, the van pulled slowly onto even ground, and slowed to a gentle stop. Kris squinted when the doors opened and even the pale, cloudy light from outside was enough to make him feel blinded. The air was fresh and charged with electricity.

“C’mon, Haz, we’re here,” Wrecker said, and Bandit was at their side now. Andrea was already being led away by an older man with blonde hair, whom Kris only could see from the back. He propped himself up on his elbows, then up to his feet, and hopped out of the van. His legs shook dangerously when he landed, but he steadied himself. Bandit slammed the doors shut behind him.

This facility wasn’t the same as the first one – still a warehouse, maybe, but converted into something that almost looked like a school, “rooms” taped off on the ground, and a couple encased in portable walls. There was noise from all directions, bouncing off the titanium that stretched high up, past the steel grid from which hundreds of over-bright fluorescents hang, lighting the whole place up like a too-white daylight. The ground was cracked concrete, the area around the doorway getting drenched by rain that had begun to fall outside. The skies opened up, and the torrent hitting the metal roof only added that much more noise.

Wrecker led the way, and Bandit stood not far behind Kris to make sure he didn’t wander off. On either side of the makeshift hallway they followed, there were whole classes’ worth of Court members, looking like an army in street clothes. There were hundreds of people just in this building, and that was only what Kris could see – how many were on the streets? In other buildings like this one, scattered across the desert? Undercover?

"This is called the schoolhouse," Bandit said lowly, noticing the way Kris looked around curiously. "The Court's training and prep center, and the base of operations for low level Military and Intelligence."

"Why're you telling me this?" Kris asked, throwing Bandit a look over his shoulder.

"Park doesn't like questions."

They led Kris through what felt like an endless maze and the only thing between him and getting swallowed alive by the sheer numbers of the Court was Wrecker and Bandit. Wrecker, for their part, was so silent it seemed almost out of character. Bandit pointed out certain areas of interest without explaining terminology - something about Infantry training and Cavalry strategy, Streets and Windows and 'info-drops.' He mentioned Park, the angry head of the Military branch, and Roman, the blonde who'd taken Andrea away, apparently the head of Intelligence. Kris, for all that he felt he should've been taking advantage of the opportunity to learn about the mysterious Court, wasn't all that interested. He just wanted to get the Heist over with an go home.

It wasn’t long until they reached a door in the actual wall, not a portable one, and Wrecker held it open for Kris to walk through first. The room was smaller, and had maybe been an office before the warehouse had been converted into whatever it was now. The whole room was lit by shitty rectangle lights embedded in the ceiling. In the middle of the room was a desk, and Park leant up against it.

“Long time no see,” Kris said, hands shoved in his pockets. Part of him wished they’d bound him so he wouldn’t have to feel like he had any semblance of independence here. He was completely under Court control.

Ey nodded, looking him up and down, sneering. “Are you going to insist on the costume during the heist?”

Kris looked down at himself, perhaps cheekily. “What d’ya mean? This is how I always dress.”

Park rolled eir eyes. Unamused. “Fine. You’ll be staying here for a few days. Do you have extra tape, then, or are you going to reuse the same garbage over and over?”

“I don’t reuse anythin’, not like you Court folks,” Kris said. He held up his canvas bag, his roll of tape, ski mask, and extra underclothes inside. “I don’t think I’ve ever done the same thing twice. That’s y’all's schtick.”

“Funny,” Park said, though ey obviously didn’t think as much. Ey rolled eir shoulders, pushing off from the desk to start pacing. “You know why you’re here. You and the Heist Squad – Wrecker, Bandit, and Attore – have one of the biggest heists in Court history coming up in a couple days. You’re not Court, and you’re just going to provide distraction and cover for the team, so we didn’t bring you in until now.”

“Who’s Attore?”

“Andrea,” Wrecker said. “Italian for ‘actor.’ Duh.”

"Why did he get brought in late, too?" Kris asked, and when Park glared he remembered that Bandit had said ey didn't like questions. Well, whatever.

"Attore doesn't need intensive preparation," Park said tightly.

"I needed to memorize the bank's layout, learn some newer tech, and Bandit had to learn the route in and out, as well as several alternates. I had to learn the way on foot, mark any potential vehicles to hotwire and take if Bandit is out of commission," Wrecker listed, counting off on their fingers. "Attore has to be fitted for a suit - the rest is up to him. That's how much the Queen and High Court trust his abilities."

"And mine," Kris said. "Y'all assume I did a good job scarin' the kid."

"There is no doubt in my mind you scared him," Wrecker said. "Whether or not he turned that into something he could use is another question."

“You’re going to be staying here for these last days until the heist, learning as much of the plan as you need to as thoroughly as possible, and getting to know the Heist Squad better,” Park continued, more gruff and annoyed than before at being interrupted. “You all need to sync, and work as a team. I know you hate being given orders and told what to do, but with your secret identity on the line, I think you’ll do just fine, Hazard.”

Kris scowled, but didn’t reply.


	10. "He's one of us!"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The heist.

The heist itself starts as chaos.

“Fucking swerve, Bandit!” Wrecker yelled, gesturing emphatically toward the next lane with their shotgun. Bandit furrowed his brow, but didn’t look over at them.

“I _can’t,_ Wrecker,” he gritted out, knuckles pale on the steering wheel. _“I’m_ driving, not you.”

Kris was almost bored, stuck in the backseat while they were chased down by police. Someone must have seen his tape while they were driving by, even through the tinted windows, and before they even got to the bank they were being hunted. Andrea was already at the bank posing as a customer. Kris hadn’t spoken to him since they said goodbye in his apartment, Kris spending his time with Park, Wrecker, and Bandit, and Andrea with Roman, elsewhere. Andrea had avoided Kris's gaze whenever they’d seen each other at the schoolhouse.

“Hazard, take the damn tape off! It’s already ruined the damn plan!” Bandit shouted, pulling a sharp turn that sent Kris sliding along the backseat, barely able to catch himself.

Kris bristled, scoffing. “No can do, _kid._ Maybe drive faster?”

Bandit growled, pulled another vicious turn, and Kris fell over. Probably on purpose, asshole.

“We need to lose the cops at least for a second,” Wrecker announced, like it wasn’t obvious, and tugged off their oversized hoodie to toss back at Kris. “Take off your jacket and put this on. We’ll jump out when we round the next good corner, and we’ll find another way to the bank. Bandit can draw the pigs away.”

Kris hesitated for only a moment, but then he heard gunfire bounce against the bulletproof back window of their armored van. He shrugged off the leather with an inhuman quickness and pulled on the black hoodie, tossing the hood up and ducking low by the door on the passenger side. Bandit kept his eyes half on the road and half on the rear-view, checking their distance. It was several yards, but definitely not far enough.

“Gonna cause a couple casualties,” he mumbled, then swerved hard. They were already in downtown La Sierra, only a couple blocks from the bank. In the center of town was a big town square like a commons or a park, complete with a playground and a fountain and plenty of space for picnics or parties. There was light tree cover and a covered picnic area with tables and a restroom, and everyone there started screaming when the huge black van tore straight through.

They didn’t hit a lot of people, though there were a few that just weren’t fast enough to get out of the way, and were bowled over in the process. Bandit’s face was level and unfeeling, though the corners of his lips did twitch down in concentration when he turned again, spitting up dirt and sod into the air and signaling for Wrecker and Kris to jump.

Pulling the strings of the hood tight to obscure his face and his knees up high to break his fall, Kris rolled out the door gracelessly, and lay still and facedown, faking like he’d been run over in case somebody thought to investigate the new bodies. Wrecker had the same idea, and soon the sirens passed. After a long moment playing dead, the both of them stood and stumbled into the family bathroom. Wrecker tugged the walkie talkie from their belt.

“We’re hiding in the bathroom,” they said, locking the door while Kris flicked on the light. He yelped, high-pitched and embarrassing, when he saw a scorpion the size of his ring finger up on the wall.

“What? What’s wrong?” Wrecker’s expression became panicked, brown eyes wide and frantic, but then they followed his gaze, and they started laughing. They lifted a leg parallel to the ground and stomped at the tile with a disgusting crunch, leaving a smear of the insect’s remains on the dingy white. “You scared of a little bug, Haz?”

“That was _not_ a little bug,” he insisted, folding his arms and ignoring the way the tape got hot on his face. “We ain’t got those fuckin’ land lobsters where I’m from.”

_“_ _’_ _Land lobsters?_ _’_ _”_

“Get to the bank, I’m leading these guys all over, but I’m gonna need Hazard’s distraction in the bank so I can pick y’all up,” Bandit buzzed in, interrupting Wrecker’s smug look, sounding as collected as ever. “Don’t make out in the bathroom too long, ya crazy kids.”

Wrecker laughed. “No problemo, babe. See ya at the bank.”

“Whatever. Good luck.”

\--

Wrecker poked their head out of the doorway and glanced around, but aside from the mourning and the dead, the park was now deserted. They stepped out into the gray day, casually, and started walking. Kris didn’t have the luxury of looking around like Wrecker did – getting seen would get him caught.

“So, Haz, what kind of bugs _do_ you have, where you’re from?” Kris and Wrecker walked casually, hands in their pockets, elbows touching.

Kris rolled his shoulders, aiming to ignore them, but the eerily empty street and the silence got to him. “Mosquitos, mostly. Mosquito hawks. Ants. Beetles, bees, wasps. No-see-ums. A lot of little shit.” He exhaled out his nose. “Out here, y’all got, like, three bugs but they’re all killer.”

“And the snakes.”

Kris nodded. “And the snakes.”

Wrecker kept going, taking in the deserted scene. Where was everybody? It was dead silent. “Where’re you from, exactly?”

“Southeast.”

“Carolinas? Georgia?”

“Somethin’ like that.”

The walkie buzzed. “Where are you guys?”

Wrecker grabbed it, held it close to their mouth. “Nearly there, Bandit. La Plaza feels like a ghost town.”

Bandit grunted. “I think the city called a state of emergency. Everyone locked down, stayin’ inside if they already are and hiding if they aren’t. Jack a bike, get inside the bank and get started. Attore is getting nervous, I’d bet.”

 _Andrea_. Kris almost couldn't believe how worried he was for the kid. “No problemo,” Wrecker said. They scanned the street until their gaze landed on a shiny yellow motorbike, gaudy and bright, and they gestured for Kris to follow as they jogged across the street toward it. It didn’t take them long to get it running.

“Hop on,” they said, taking the front, and Kris took the back without complaint, wrapping his arms around their waist.

They whizzed down the streets, churning out black exhaust and paying anything aside from their route no mind. Kris kept his head down, forehead between Wrecker’s shoulder blades for balance and stability, keeping his tape as hidden as he could. The street underneath them streaked by all black and white and yellow, a warning like his tape for what was to come.

He should’a jumped off. Tucked and rolled and ran away, cut off his tape in the middle of the desert and ran and ran until he couldn’t anymore, legs buckling from exhaustion. A broiling discomfort in his gut foretold tragedy, told him that something was gonna go wrong with this goddamned heist, or maybe that was just motion sickness. Either way he wanted to hurl both his body from the bike and his breakfast from his body.

But he didn’t. He held on. Wrecker would put a bullet in his back before he got ten feet, anyway.

“Y’alright back there?” Wrecker shouted over the wind and the roar and the blood in Kris’s ears, and he nodded against their back.

The bank itself was regal and huge, not so much tall as wide and all in brick and marble, columns and glass and stairs. 'El Banco de la Plata' in huge silver letters stuck to the brick above the door reflected the dismal light into too-bright starbursts. Wrecker found the wheelchair ramp and skidded up to the front doors, leaving black streaks on the tiles. They dismounted, Kris following after, and with a solid kick Wrecker kicked the bike down the front stairs. They weren’t gonna need it – with any luck, Bandit was coming back for them after the heist.

“Ready?” Wrecker asked, under their breath, their back pressed to the broad front windows. Kris could feel the eyes of those inside on him, watching his and Wrecker’s every move. He banished his dread and allowed himself to get excited, fighting off a grin. He hadn’t done a big game since the night he’d met Andrea, the Queen, Wrecker themself. He drew his pistols from his waistband and nodded.

“O’ course,” he said, and Wrecker broke a broad smile. They cocked their shotgun and leaned back, opening the door. Kris did the same, shaking his head to get the hood to fall back while they pushed in the doors.

“This is a heist!” he shouted, like he’d rehearsed back at the schoolhouse over and over, simulating this first moment. Establishing power was a key, make-or-break part of the heist, Park had insisted. “Get the fuck on the ground!”

The whole crowd moved as one, making noise and falling to their knees, to their asses. One woman, a bank teller behind the counter with wide eyes and stringy hair, gasped and ducked, reaching for her back pocket. Kris stomped around the counter and shot her in the head. The crowd, about twenty people who had gone into whispers when he and Wrecker had come in, fell deadly silent after the shot. The woman’s phone fell from her hand and she fell to her side.

“My name’s Wrecker, and this is my buddy Hazard,” Wrecker announced, and their voice echoed powerfully through the room. Kris ushered the other two tellers around the counter to sit with the rest of the hostages. A cursory sweep revealed Andrea, shaking against the front of the counter in a chocolate brown suit and a pale blue undershirt. He stared at Kris with scared eyes, and Kris wondered how much of that was acting. “We’re gonna guide you through this.”

“None o’ y’all are gonna get hurt unless y’all decide not to do what we say,” Kris cut in. “Or I get bored.” He smirked, hidden behind the tape, but he knew his reckless abandon would show in his eyes. “Understood?”

Scattered nods. He shook his head. “I said, UNDERSTOOD?” he roared. Several flinched. A child clinging to his mother’s hand started crying amidst the yeses and yes, sirs. Kris laughed. “That’s better.”

“Employees, one of you lead me to the highest manager available,” Wrecker continued. “Hazard will keep the rest of you comfy.”

One of the tellers stood after a tense moment, and gestured for Wrecker to follow him upstairs. They smirked and jogged up behind him, pressing the barrel of their sawed-off to his mid-back to urge him on.

Alone with the hostages, Kris was in his element.

He paced, slow and predatory, for several minutes. He tucked one of his pistols back in his belt for convenience’s sake, not looking too much at the hostages. They were all cowering close together, some of them sprawled out and some of them with their knees to their chests. Andrea, among them, blended in well. Kris’s eyes were drawn to him over and over nonetheless.

He groaned, long and drawn out. “This is so _boring,_ _”_ he drawled, tossing his head back. “Can y’all believe this? I don’t even fuckin’ _like_ the Court.” He kicked a man’s foot, scuffing the shiny leather with his boot and making his breath hitch. “This is bull.”

The younger hostages shook harder. He _had_ said he’d hurt them when he got bored. He inspected the pistol in his hand, cocked it. “So. Who wants to go first?”

No one responded. “Wh- what do you mean?” the man whose foot he’d kicked responded. He hadn’t moved.

Kris kept walking, aiming for intimidating and, by the looks of it, he’d succeeded. The child was still sniffling into his mother’s side, red-faced and noisy. Kris usually tried not to kill children, so he pointedly ignored him, no matter how annoying he was.

“I mean that I’m in a mood to hit a guy.” Sirens outside. _Damn_. Well, it was a matter of time. He pointed his gun at the guy with the shoes, pointedly and obviously, so the police outside could see. “How ‘bout you, bud?”

“What?”

Kris planted a bullet in the marble by his hand, and he jumped with a high yelp. He stumbled to his feet. Kris gestured to come stand by him, and threw an arm over his shoulders companionably. The guy trembled.

“So what’s your name, sir?” The man was taller than Kris and paler, soft around the middle, probably in his forties. Brown hair, green eyes, slightly balding, but with a short, full beard. Run of the mill and replaceable.

“L-Larry Poole,” he stuttered, staring at his scuffed shoe.

Kris adjusted his grip on his shoulder, pulling poor Larry closer to his side. “Great name. Solid.” He pressed his gun to Larry’s cheek, making him flinch. Kris smiled.

“You didn’t let Sydney say _her_ name.”

Kris looked up, expression falling for a moment. Andrea hadn’t stood up, but he was looking up at Kris with a thin mask of defiance on top of his fear. He was speaking with his own accent.

“Excuse me?” Kris kept his face blank, needlessly. He hadn’t prepared for banter. He hadn’t thought Andrea would speak to him.

Andrea stood up, little brown fists shaking at his sides. “I’m Luca. You killed my date at _La Montagne Cachée._ _”_ His French was flawlessly pronounced, but Kris recalled that he didn’t speak that particular romance language. Stickler for pronunciation?

Kris broke into a smile. “You’re that kid from the French restaurant. I remember you.” Keeping up an older character for drama. _Exciting_. The hostages, terrified as they were, looked intrigued. They glanced between Kris and Andrea with interest and unease.

Moving his gun, Kris shot Larry in the shoulder, aiming up at the joint from under the clavicle. Andrea gasped, eyes going wide in fear. Real? Acted? Larry Poole screamed as Kris threw him back down into his spot on the floor, forgetting about him instantly. The mother screamed and her child began to cry with renewed vigor. A couple others had outbursts, but most stayed silent, staring into the difference or at Kris himself. Larry Poole fell quiet but for labored breathing, trying to put pressure on the wound one-handed.

Kris gestured with his free hand for Andrea to approach and after a hesitant moment, he did.

“Long time no see, kid,” Kris said, putting his arm around Andrea. He was shaking hard, and hiding it well. That puzzled Kris – if he was playing the part of a terrified victim, why did he hide his fear? Even if it was real, he could use it. Play up the realism. “How ya been?”

“Traumatized,” Andrea said, voice wobbling but deadpan, and Kris barked a genuine laugh.

“Is that so?” he tugged on Andrea’s shoulder playfully, and the kid didn’t respond, dropping his gaze to stare at his shoes. Kris’s grin spread, and he dropped the kid’s shoulder, pushing him back and moving so they were facing each other. Andrea looked him in the face, questioningly, but not too familiar. The kid was good. If Kris had been a bystander, he’d believe they never met.

There was a gunshot and a shout from upstairs, a door opening and shutting. Quiet footsteps. Kris only let his attention divert for a moment. A phone behind the bank counter rang but he let it die, fixed on Andrea.

Without warning, he decked him. Punched him right in the face, across one high cheekbone and Andrea grunted, scrambled back, clutching at his face. He fell to his knees. Kris was violently reminded of the night he’d killed that little girl, dragged Andrea into the apartment and hit him and yelled. _“_ _I_ _’_ _m_ sixteen, _Hazard! F_ _or Christ_ _’_ _s sake!_ _”_ He resisted a disgusted shiver, a blossoming of guilt.

Andrea peered up at him, eyes wet with pain, and his stomach twisted. _Fuck_. Nothing he could do. He had to commit.

Kris smiled, shaking out his fist with a low whistle, then lifted a leg and planted his boot against Andrea’s shoulder, kicking him down with ease. Andrea didn’t resist, but he glared with what seemed to be every ounce of hate in his body. Stomping over to where he was sprawled, he straddled Andrea’s chest and grabbed his collar, leaning down to talk into his ear.

“I’d say sorry, but this is fun,” he murmured, and Andrea snorted, an aborted laugh he tried to disguise with a gasp of fear. It helped ease the tightness in his chest and Kris snickered and leaned back. He faked the next punch and barely skimmed Andrea’s cheek, but his head snapped back anyway, near-missing the floor. Kris ignored the urge to hit him again for real, just to hear the crack of his skull against marble, a bloodthirsty impulse that made him sick. Instead, he stood and paced, restlessly. Andrea laid his head down on the ground, clutching his cheek and breathing deeply, too-fast through his nose. Suddenly, Kris whirled and kicked him in the ribs, harder perhaps than he’d meant, and pushed him a foot across the floor. Andrea groaned, rolling over onto his other side.

The phone behind the counter rang again. Several hostages looked up at it with hopeful expressions. Kris strolled around the counter and tore the phone from the wall, throwing it across the floor with a clatter and a muttered curse.

He walked back to where Andrea was still on the floor, clutching his face with one hand and looking up at him with a turbulent fear. Kris smiled, hidden by the tape, and reached down a hand to help him up. Andrea took it, his own hand shaking, and Kris pulled him up too hard, popping his shoulder. He looked genuinely afraid of what Kris would do to him, and though Kris knew he was acting, a voice in the back of his mind was wondering if he’d missed something. Kris breathed in his fear like smoke from a building on fire.

“What’re ya shakin’ for, kid?” He kept his voice low and dangerous, too close to Andrea’s face, and the kid shivered. “Scared?” He raised his gun and drew it slowly up, tracing a cheekbone and ruffling his hair. He had his finger on the trigger, mostly for show, but the taste of danger on his tongue was intoxicating. He needed to stop. “Maybe ya should be,” he mused, and Andrea’s eyes flicked down to where Kris’s mouth would have been, eyes dilated with- was that lust? Kris had almost forgotten about the kid’s semi-confession the day they left to prepare for the heist. He _really_ needed to stop, to back away, to throw Andrea back to the other hostages.

“I’m terrified,” Andrea whimpered, throat raw. His eyes were filled with something unfathomable. Something was wrong. _Something was wrong._ His gun was still pressed to Andrea’s temple. "I'm sorry."

A door upstairs slammed open, loud and sudden, and Kris jumped.

_BANG!_

“Hazard, I got the money, let’s go!”

Andrea’s eyes were wide when his legs gave out beneath him, staring at Kris in with tears in his eyes while his head leaked through the twin holes on either side. Kris couldn’t move, his stomach up in his throat, and he wanted to puke it up and out. He hadn’t pulled the trigger, he could’a sworn – but there it was, the evidence bleeding out at his feet, staring up at him with a look of betrayal. The blood in his ears was the loudest thing he’d ever heard.

Wrecker stomped down the stairs but the triumphant look on their face faded into shock then horror when they saw Andrea.

“I didn’t-” Kris started, but his throat choked him off. He couldn’t keep his eyes off Andrea, even when he collapsed and went still, blood pooling around his head like a halo.

“Hazard, what did you _do!?_ _”_ Wrecker screamed, over the assorted sounds of terror from the crowd of hostages. “He’s one of US! You _killed_ him! HE WASN’T A FUCKING HOSTAGE, HAZARD!” Their face had gone wild, and Kris noticed a blood spatter on the arm that clutched their filled duffel bag.

“I didn’t-” Kris tried again, but he looked back down at Andrea, and oh god, he was gonna be sick. _Fuck_. He’d killed Andrea. _He_ _’_ _d killed him._

“Yeah you fucking did!” Wrecker was red faced, tear streaked. They looked like they wanted to fall to their knees and hold Andrea- Andrea’s _corpse_ , but they glanced over their shoulder at the police outside. “I hope the Queen fucking kills you, or else I’m gonna do it myself,” they growled, stepping up to him and grabbing his collar. They threw him back and he stumbled. “Follow me.”

They ran together, abandoning Andrea and the rest of the hostages all at once to run to the back doors, shooting out the locks and getting outside. Kris was on autopilot, mind still reeling. Bandit was waiting in the van, and pulled a face when the two of them ran out alone. Ducking gunfire from either end of this back alley, Kris and Wrecker pulled themselves inside.

“Where’s Attore?” Bandit asked, harried. “Is he coming? Why the fuck did you guys leave-?”

“He's dead!” Wrecker hissed, climbing up and over into the passenger seat while Kris slammed the door shut. Bandit looked at them like he didn’t believe it, horrified, and stared at Kris, but Kris couldn’t look him in the eyes, staring at his hands and the Court-issued pistol in them. “Hazard _killed_ him.”

"Are you fucking serious?!" Bandit shouted, knuckles white on the wheel, then turned back to Wrecker. "You- Why the hell is he  _here?_ You should've killed him inside!"

“The Queen will want to punish him,” Wrecker said. Bandit stared at them, then nodded slowly. “She’ll do worse than we ever could.”

“You’re right.” He stuck his hand out to Kris. “Give me your pistols.”

Kris complied without complaint. His stomach was tearing itself to pieces, and he wanted- hell, he wanted to cry. He hadn’t cried in years, but the burning in his eyes matched the burn of acid in his throat. He never wanted to shoot again.

While they tore out of the alley, bowling over and through cops and their cars on the way, Kris reached up and started to unwrap his tape.


	11. "What color is his hair?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andrea gears up for the heist.

Andrea could feel Kris’s eyes on him when he stepped out onto the sidewalk. “Cam, what are you doing here?”

They smiled, lopsided. The fog in their eyes showed they were only a little tipsy, practically sober by their standards. “I’m pickin’ you guys up. We’re heading for the schoolhouse.”

“It’s time?” Damn, damn, damn, damn, _damn._ He should have known this- the comfortable domesticity he’d fallen into with Kris wasn’t going to last, of _course_ it wasn’t, why would he deserve to be happy?

(Happy. He guessed that was the closest word to the mass of emotions he felt - nervous and excited and wistful and vulnerable and protected, under the care of a violent criminal with a past as inscrutable as his mask.)

Cam nodded. “Yeah. How long’ll it take to get your stuff together?”

“A couple minutes. Kr- Hazard needs to put his tape on.” He choked on Kris’s name, but Cam didn’t notice. They looked impressed, eyes wide and leaning their shoulders back.

“What, you’ve seen his face?”

Andrea nodded. “At first he wore a ski mask around the apartment, but now he’s-” _He's Kris._ “He doesn’t anymore.”

Their face lit up. “Dude, what color is his hair?”

Andrea furrowed his brow, confused, but he answered anyway. “I- Blonde. Bleached blonde. Why?”

A broad smile overtook their face, revealing crooked teeth only slightly yellowed by a caffeine addiction. “Ah, man, that’s- JC said it was probably brown or dark blonde. I can’t wait to tell him he was wrong, holy _shit._ _”_

Andrea rolled his eyes. “Is that all?” He shifted his weight, impatiently, like his stomach wasn’t knotted up tight and painful. He didn’t want to go to the schoolhouse and, god, he didn’t want to do the heist. While he was with Kris he could almost forget about it, about the plan that Park and the Queen had put in place, about his part in it all, but Cam was an unwelcome reminder that set his teeth on edge.

They nodded. “You ready to come home?” There was an edge of excitement to their voice, like they thought that ‘going home’ was a viable option after the heist.

He stiffened, completely froze. He scuffed the tip of his sneaker on the sidewalk, feigning casual. “Do I have to?” When they looked at him funny he continued, too quick and trying to cover his ass. "I- I mean, will I be able to see him after- well, you know?"

Cam just laughed. “Why do you wanna see this guy again? I saw some of the shit he put you through on the news - fuckin' _brutal,_ man.” Andrea frowned and Cam softened, got a little more serious. "You know the plan, bud. You know that's not possible, especially after we deal with Hazard. Even if you _do_ avoid getting your stupid ass shot in the brain and recover."  His throat tightened up. Oh, god, he wanted to warn Kris, tell him what the Queen had planned. Surely-  _surely_ Kris would protect him, right? Andrea had never felt so safe as he did with Kris, and- and with Kris's hate of the Court, Andrea could convince him and they could leave La Sierra-

Andrea caught himself before the thought got too far. No, the Queen would follow them anywhere. She was willing to go this far.

“What about- about after he's dealt with?” Andrea asked, voice tight in his throat. He left off the  _"if"_ he didn't want to think about.  _If I survive._

They rolled their eyes, and Andrea wanted to hit them. “Go get your stuff, I’ll meet you back down here.”

\--

“They say we need to go to the Court, immediately. You need to tape up.”

“What’s wrong?” Kris sounded worried, and kept his eyes on Andrea while he fumbled with the safe he kept under his bed, pulling it in his lap and opening it.

Andrea shrugged. He couldn’t look at Kris, something like guilt tearing at his stomach from the inside. “They- Something Wrecker said bothered me,” he said, oversimplified.

“What was it?”

He watched Cam out the window in silence while Kris changed and started taping up. “I, um. I asked them if- if maybe, after the heist, I could, um,” he started after a long time, carefully. “I could still see you, sometimes. And- I guess I forgot that you're the enemy.” He swallowed. “They said no.”

“Why would you wanna stay here? I can’t imagine sleepin’ on my couch for three months was all that comfortable.”

Andrea smiled. “That it wasn’t. But it was-” He choked on emotion, looking around the apartment, at that ratty couch he’d slept on all this time, at the table and at Kris’s bed. Kris patted the spot next to him, and Andrea only hesitated for a second. He’d never touched the bed before, scared of what Kris would do, scared of what _he_ might do. “It was...”

“I’m gonna miss ya, kid,” Kris said, head half wrapped in hazard tape. Caught somewhere between the man Andrea- the man he had grown to- and the criminal that still scared him deep to his core. “I ain’t had company in a long time and you wasn’t a bad partner in crime, neither,” he continued, pausing to chuckle. Andrea couldn’t pull his eyes from his mouth. _This is the last time…_ “The Court’ll be lucky to have ya. And I’m sure as damn well ready to stop dealin’ with-”

Andrea barely registered when he stopped talking, lip caught between his teeth and staring at Kris’s. He swallowed his fear and made to close the distance between them, a confession he couldn’t make aloud, could barely articulate even in his mind-

“I- No, Andrea, no,” Kris nearly shouted, jumping to his feet and gesturing wildly with one hand. “No. Eleven years older than you, no.” He shook his head, over and over and over.

Embarrassment blossomed like fire in Andrea’s throat, sealing his throat. “Oh, oh!” He was inarticulate, oh god, Kris thought he was an _idiot._ No, worse: a child. “I- I’m sorry, that was- That was uncalled for, I just-” He felt the fire spread up through his cheeks and behind his eyes. He _felt_ like a child. Why the hell had he thought that was a good idea? “I- I’m sorry. I wanted to- I wanted to tell you in c-case we didn’t-” _Shut up, Andrea!_ “In case we didn’t see each other again.” Is that subtle enough? Apparently stopping the word vomit was impossible, though stifling the flow was nearly doable. “But I couldn’t figure out h-how to say it, so I just- I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He forced himself up off Kris’s bed like it physically hurt him to stay, hurt him to leave.

There was a creak as Kris sat back down. “Kid- Andrea, I’m flattered,” he said. His voice was muffled by the tape. “But you’re sixteen. I’m twenty-seven. That’s fucked up.” He tugged on his leather jacket and Andrea’s heartstrings all at once.

“And if I wasn’t sixteen?” Andrea hated the desperate undertone his voice took on, but he couldn’t help it.

Kris shrugged. “I dunno, kid, but you are. And I’m not interested.” He looked at Andrea and their eyes caught for a long moment, Kris’s expression unfathomable and Andrea’s heart on his goddamn sleeve, exposed and aching. Kris tore his eyes away, breaking the moment. “Get your shit, we’re leaving.”

Andrea nodded and shouldered his bag.

\--

“Andrea, are you ready?”

“No!” Andrea shouted, maybe hysterical, but reasonably so. He shook his head over and over until his brain hurt. “No, I’m not!” His hands were trembling while he paced Roman’s office, claustrophobic as it was, all windowless and dark. It didn’t help. “I’m _not_ ready, Roman. Are you- are we sure there is no other way?”

Roman pinched the bridge of his nose up under his wireframe glasses, a frown pulling his lined face taut. It was a strange look on him – the Russian was usually almost exceptionally open and friendly, if a little inappropriate with those under his command. The Court’s head of Intelligence was a well-liked man for his good moods, and as such was starkly different from Park. “Andrea, you know we can’t defy-”

“I can convince him, I swear!” His eyes were wide like a deer caught in headlights, desperate and pleading. Kris was volatile and dangerous, but Andrea had a feeling he knew him better than anyone else ever could. Even after the- after the rejection, Andrea was sure he could talk Kris into doing what the Queen wanted without the original plan. “Let me speak to the Queen, _please!_ I can’t go through with this!” He wished Kris was here, longed for his presence, but if Kris knew what he was being forced into-

 _“_ _No,_ Andrea!” Roman boomed, a vein in his neck popping and his face bright red. “We do _not_ question the Queen. She has made her decision!” The finality in his tone turned Andrea’s blood to ice and he stopped his pacing, took a couple paces back, unconsciously.

Tears welled in Andrea’s eyes as he stared up at Roman, dread hanging hard and heavy like a lead sphere in his gut. Oh, god, this was actually going to happen. And there was nothing he could do.

“I’m sorry, Andrea,” Roman finished, but his tone was empty. He took his glasses off and averted his gaze, avoided looking at Andrea altogether. Acid rose in Andrea’s throat.

“No, you’re not,” Andrea spat, glaring. “None of you are. If you were sorry, you’d have stopped this before it started. You would have come up with a different plan.”

“The Queen is confident-”

“But _you’re_ not.” And that thought was harder to swallow than any other. _Nobody_ was confident about this. No one, not _one_ goddamn person here who knew the truth would look him in the eye. The Court’s doctors were great, but could they pull off miracles?

Andrea drew himself up, straightened out, put on a cold mask. Professional. “I want to speak to Hazard.” His voice didn’t waver.

Roman shook his head. “You can’t. Not now that you’ve expressed your doubts. You could ruin the heist.”

Frustration boiled hot in Andrea’s chest and he wanted to lash out. He hid this. Blinked. “But we need to decide-”

“You’re an expert actor and Hazard is known for his improvisation.” Roman sniffed, turning and going back to his seat behind his desk. “I’m sure you can figure it out, ah, on the fly.”

“But what if _that_ ruins the heist?”

“Then that’s on you.” Roman wasn’t even paying attention anymore it seemed, clicking and typing away at something on his laptop, but he took a moment to level a glare over the top of his glasses, grey eyes piercing. “If I let you speak to him beforehand, that’s my fault.”

 _I don’t CARE!_ Andrea clenched his fists and his jaw all at once. He sucked in a quick breath through his nose, the only hint at his true mood. If someone were to walk in, they’d find no hint of his tantrum from mere moments before. “Roman, if we miscommunicate, or if he doesn’t-”

“Andrea, stop!” Roman slammed his palm on the desktop and Andrea jumped, despite himself, alongside the clatter of pens and other business-type paraphernalia. “You’re scared, and I understand that! But there’s nothing to do about it now!” He pushed his glasses up his nose and fixed Andrea with a look that tore through him like knives. “You are going on that heist. Hazard will watch you die. He will join the Court. _It’s that simple._ The Queen has said it, and so it shall be done. If you survive your wounds, great. I’ll see you back here as soon as possible.” He sniffed, glaring one last long moment at Andrea before turning back to his laptop. “Now, get the hell out of my office. I have business to attend to, and you have important things to do aside from trying to instigate treason.”


	12. "Who'd you kill?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris meets with the Queen post-heist. She has an ultimatum.

The safe house in the hills was old and dilapidated on the outside, all dried wood and adobe, blending in with the brush and endless desert rocks. Inside it was clean and nearly unlived in like something out of a magazine, but after three days it was almost homely. Kris kept himself locked into the room he’d claimed, face bared but covered in his hands while he had his breakdown. He’d given up his name to Wrecker and Bandit and told them his side of what happened, detail by detail, but Wrecker – apparently named Cameron Huang – never softened. Kris couldn’t blame them. Even though he knew everything he said was true, or at least true to him, it felt like excuses. Bandit – JC Stevens – at least looked at him with something like pity, a sentiment Kris could understand. When he was finally dragged in front of the Queen she would have him executed, he could feel it. He had killed something that was hers, and until he was dealt with, he was a thing to be either scorned or pitied. He was a walking corpse.

 _God._ The last damn honest thing Kris had said to Andrea was a fucking _rejection_. And now the kid was dead. Kris had carved long welts into his upper arms with his nails in the shower, clutching himself and trying to breathe. When he was younger (and hell, up until a couple years ago it wasn't much different), he had spent every fucking second hating himself and thinking he was some kinda fucked up and horrible. He'd only ever felt  _this_ low, however, a handful of times: running away from home, Texas, the night he left Phoenix.

The dawn was only a watery blue for an hour or two before the storm rolled in, rumbling and crashing with thunder and lightning over the crisp desert winter. Kris came out of his room without his tape – he hadn’t worn it at all, the weekend they stayed in the safe house. He was wearing his same clothes from the heist, unwashed and stiff, but Cam and JC had clothes stashed here – this is where they came after every heist, while the manhunt calmed down, before they were picked up by the Court.

“I’m sure the Queen will hear you out,” JC said, patting his shoulder. They were stood in the foyer, Cam staring out the front windows for any sign of their ride. His voice was soft, soothing. Kris had learned, in the short time he’d spent with JC, that the guy was pretty calm, most of the time. During a heist it manifested as being cold and hard, but in the calm after the storm (or, well, during it) he was caring and reasonable, logical. It was a jarring contrast to Cam’s frenetic excitability.

Cam scoffed. They weren’t excited now. “I doubt it. She had her own brothers executed when she thought they were planning a rebellion. They didn’t like that their baby sister had all the power she did.” They smirked. “Now she has even more, and she’s more bloodthirsty than ever.” They looked over their shoulder at Kris, a vicious look on their face. “God, I hope she kills you. You deserve so much worse for killing Andrea.”

“Cam, please. You know he’s upset about it,” JC said. His hand was still on Kris’s shoulder comfortingly. Kris didn't have the energy to shrug it off. _“_ _I_ think it was an accident, at least.”

“Oh, so he _accidentally_ aimed a gun at a sixteen year old ally’s head, and _accidentally_ pulled the trigger?” Cam’s temper was hotter than JC’s too. That fiery spite once the latter had learned of Andrea’s fate seemed to be the exception, not the rule, tensions heightened by gunfire. “That makes so much fucking sense, thanks Jace!” They threw their arms up, glaring.

“You’re right, Cam,” Kris said, lowly, a little wary of using first names but they'd insisted despite their anger. He hadn’t spoken much over the time here, instead locked up in his room, thinking and sleeping and working out until his arms threatened to self-amputate to escape the overwork. His throat was dry, his voice rough. “I should be executed. I was reckless.”

JC looked at him inscrutably. He had tried to come visit him, sit with him, talk to him in his room, but Kris hadn’t responded. Just the night before he’d sat with his back against Kris’s door for hours. They hadn’t spoken, but the presence was comforting. Not that Kris had told JC that. “Dude- Kris, you’re _Hazard_. Reckless is your thing! I half expected you to kill all three of us.”

“I- I know, but-” _Andrea trusted me_. Kris swallowed. “Andrea- We were close. I cared about him. And I killed him.” Kris’s throat was tight. “If the Queen doesn’t kill me, I sure as hell might.”

JC’s eyes went wide. “Kris-”

“There’s no need for that, Hazard,” said a cool voice from the doorway. Their ride had arrived, and in the doorway a tall woman with sunglasses despite the dark downpour stood. She didn’t seem thrown off by seeing his face. “Come on.”

“Comin’, Perez,” Cam said, slinging their bag over their shoulder. Kris went to follow the both of them, but JC grabbed his shoulder.

“JC, we need to go,” Kris intoned.

JC shook his head. “Yeah, I know, I just-” He bit his lip, looked at the rain streaked window, then looked back to Kris with something like desperation in his eyes, like he was pleading. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

Kris furrowed his brow. “Excuse me?”

“C’mon, guys!” Cam yelled from outside, and JC rolled his eyes.

“One sec!” He tightened his grip on Kris’s arm. “I- Kris, I don’t know you. But, somehow, I trust you.” He paused. “I don’t know what you- I don’t know what you _believe,_ but I know that what’s gonna happen is what’s meant to happen.” When Kris pulled a face, JC shook his head. “Look, I just- if the Queen doesn’t kill you – and the odds are that she definitely will – I think it’ll be for the best to see how it all pans out. The Court isn’t as bad as you think. If anything, you can use its resources to your advantage.”

“Why aren’t you mad?” Kris asked, brow furrowed. “I _killed_ Andrea. You said- in the car, you said you wanted me dead for what I did.”

“People die,” JC said with a deathly seriousness. “Sometimes as a result of our actions. That doesn’t mean we deserve to die as well.”

Kris snorted derisively. “Sounds like experience. Who’d you kill?”

JC’s voice caught in his throat and he frowned. “That’s none of your damned business. Perez is waiting.” He nearly ran out into the rain and Kris wondered if he’d hit a nerve.

They were halfway back to La Sierra when Perez asked the question Kris had been dreading.

“Where’s the little one?” She kept her glasses on, even though she was driving. Her dark hair was slick with rain, and flung over the back of the driver’s seat. It reached down pretty damn far. "Does it have to do with bare-faced Hazard contemplating suicide?" So she hadn't heard the whole exchange when she walked in.

“Hazard killed him,” Cam said immediately, feet on the dash and eyes on their phone. Why they had a smartphone, probably traceable and incredibly dangerous for a known criminal, was a mystery. “Fucker says it was an accident, but it was clean through the side of the head. Point blank.”

Perez’s eyebrows lowered dangerously. “How the fuck does that kind of shit happen on accident?”

Cam shrugged. “I dunno. I don’t believe a goddamn word he says. JC’s bleeding heart does, though.”

Kris stared out the dark tinted window at the rain, cacti in the distance probably over-watered from the terrible weather of the last two weeks. “I killed him. I didn’t mean to, but I killed him.”

Perez nodded. “What do you think _la reina_ will decide when she hears the news?”

He shrugged. “Kill me.”

She nodded again and the car went silent. JC reached over to comfortingly squeeze Kris’s shoulder again, and he wasn’t sure if he was weirded out by all the physical contact or actually comforted. Either way, he leaned into it, and felt like he didn’t deserve it.

\--

Kris scraped his knees when Cam and JC threw him down before the Queen, back in the warehouse where he’d first seen her. She was regal as ever, in her makeshift throne by the two big bloodstains, and he wondered if they were from other executions. Her brothers, maybe? If Cam’s story was to be believed, that is. Her brown steel chair was as every bit as inelegant as she was flawless and powerful. He’d learned, while training at the schoolhouse, that this building was called the throne room. _Fitting._

Park was stood where Andrea had been, at the Queen’s left, assault rifle held casually in eir hands and glaring at Kris like he’d personally insulted em. Perez leaped up onto the stage and took her spot at the Queen’s right with steely stoicism. There were armed guards once more at either side of the stage, and by all the exits, dressed in street clothes and wielding heavier weapons than they should have had access to, but, well. That’s the Court for ya.

“Hazard,” the Queen began, voice low and dangerous. One of the bare bulbs overhead flickered and died just then, ominously. At any other time Kris would have snickered at the melodrama. “You’ve killed one of the most promising members of my Court, and have revealed your face to us of your own accord. You endangered a heist and failed to uphold a deal made in my name. You are here to receive punishment. Am I correct?”

Straight to business, then. Kris stared blankly at her knees, revealed by a short denim skirt, and nodded. His arms were bound behind him with duct tape, something the guards by the front doors had done upon entry. “Yes, I am.”

“Have you also revealed your name?” She looked over him to Cam and JC. She wasn’t asking Kris.

“Kris Palmetto,” Cam said, and Kris flinched at hearing it spoken aloud. “Kris with a K, Palmetto like the tree.”

The Queen nodded, quirking a smile. “Cute name. Made it up yourself?” Kris nodded. “Thought so.” She turned her attention to Perez. “I want to kill him,” she said, and Kris stared at his knees, feeling his whole body stiffen. “But I’m sure you have a better idea, don’t you, Rosa?”

Perez half-shrugged, and rolled her neck. “If you want to, why not just do it?”

“I feel like that’s a waste.” The Queen looked back at Kris, analyzing him like an equation. Her eyes were quick, smart, like she was hiding something. She settled back in her seat, crossing her legs and slouching a little, looking ever more like she owned the whole damn world under her feet. “I’ve decided. I will let you decide, Kris.”

Kris snapped his head up to stare at her, eyes wide. He heard JC gasp behind him.

“What!?” Cam shouted, but quickly silenced with a glare from Perez and a look from the Queen herself.

The Queen look back to Kris, and her smile had spread almost evilly with the smugness in her decision. “You have two choices. One, I execute you right now. Park puts a bullet in your skull, you stain the concrete. A life for a life, as is fair.” Then her smile grew, and she sat up straighter, like her favorite movie just got to the best part. Kris swallowed. “Two, you join my Court. A life for a life. You will train under Park and Roman, you will join wherever fits best, and you will serve me in Andrea’s place.”

Her teeth looked pointed and wicked in this light while she smiled ever wider, watching him with glee. “What do you say, Kris?”

Kris frowned. “I’m not an actor. I can’t do what Andrea does- did.”

The Queen shrugged, casual as anything, as if a life didn’t hang in the balance. “I’m sure we can find a use for you, Hazard.”

Kris nodded, swallowed hard, and made his decision.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check my author page for the work "Andrea was shaking." It's a one-shot that you can really read at any time in this story but it was posted around the same time as this chapter was, so for the Authentic Experience I'd read it now.


	13. "I don't spar."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris begins his Court training.

He had to wait two weeks before the next class started, and when the time came Kris found himself packed into a room in the schoolhouse with thirty other people sweating and milling about. It was uncomfortably warm inside, Kris’s t-shirt sticking to his back and his leather jacket tucked under one arm. Everyone was talking, waiting for this whole Court joining business to get started. This was their first meeting in what Kris had been informed was a process several months long.

Thus far it was nothing like the personalized, fast-paced training he'd already experienced at the hands of the Court. Kris hadn't been left alone for a second in the days leading up to the heist and had had to sleep in his ski mask to keep his identity hidden.

Kris felt out of place among what was mostly teenagers and kids in their early twenties, taller and broader and _bigger_ , in most cases. None of the kids matched him for muscle mass or gruff demeanor, and they afforded him more personal space than he was due. It didn’t help the heat and he scowled, grumbling. It was _December_ _,_ and in the desert, no less. It was cold as hell outside, which only made the musky indoor air that much more jarring.

Two weeks between making his decision to join the Queen's Court and this first hand-to-hand combat training session. Two weeks spent in a safehouse just _waiting,_ in between being interrogated for details on Andrea’s death and his own past. They could follow his paper trail back two years to his legal name change, but anything beyond that was much more difficult to find. Even if they were to find his dead name - which they wouldn’t, if Kris had anything to say about it - there was a six year gap between graduating high school and moving to La Sierra that was unaccounted for, legally. He went by so many names trying to get away from home and find himself that it was impossible to track his movements.

Part of him missed his apartment, or at least the privacy of it, but last time he’d been there, Andrea had been alive. That wound was still fresh and he didn’t fancy submerging himself in the memory. As long as he kept his mind busy, he could ignore the way guilt plagued his every thought. He hoped training would be the distraction he needed.

When Park entered the room Kris didn’t see em at first, but the way the crowd grew rapidly silent and parted around em clued him in. Kris, standing solidly in the center of the room like a bullseye, didn’t move when Park met him there.

“Are you gonna let me through?” Park asked with a glare.

Kris shrugged, looking at all the empty space surrounding him. “Can’t see why you can’t walk around.”

Instead of the banter he expected, Park backhanded him without preamble or pause. Kris didn’t cry out but his eyes went wide and he stumbled aside in shock, letting Park get to the front of the room.

“Anyone else want to argue?” Park asked. The door slammed shut at the back of the room, heavy and slow to close after Park’s entrance. No one made a sound. “Good.”

Ey began to pace, effectively clearing the front of the room for emself. The wide berth Kris had been given was now forgotten and teenagers shoved him out of the way to make room. They were more afraid of Park than of him.

“I’m High Admiral Emsley Park,” ey began. “You will call me ‘Admiral,’ ‘Park,’ or ‘Admiral Park.’ I’m part of the Queen’s High Court, and the closest most of you will ever get to Her Majesty. If you intend to join the Infantry, Cavalry, or the Heist Crew, I’m also your future boss. I run any and all Military strategic operations in the Court.”

There were various surges of whispering at the mention of the Heist Crew. Park didn’t pause.

“I am GenderQueer and will only accept Spivak pronouns. If you don’t know what that means, I suggest you keep your mouth shut until you look them up,” ey continued. “The Court isn’t for bigots and idiots. I am certainly not the exception to the norm. Best get used to it now or get the hell out.”

No one moved. Kris was shocked at eir openness, a phantom envy licking up the back of his neck like fire.

Ey stopped pacing dead center, hands folded behind eir back and feet shoulders-width apart. Eir glasses glinted in the trembling fluorescent light. “First lesson - do not disobey.” Ey stared at Kris. “Palmetto, up here.”

Kris’s first instinct was to talk back, but his cheek still stung after Park's previous blow. He picked through the crowd in silence, all eyes on him. He heard his surname whispered among the crowd and turned his back to them, facing Park head-on. He rested most of his weight on one leg, fingers shoved in his pockets.

“You're awfully defiant for someone who's chosen to be here, Palmetto,” Park said, loud enough for the room to hear.

“It's not like I had much of a choice,” Kris drawled back, not bothering to hide his annoyance.

Park looked like ey wanted to slap him again, but contained emself with a wolfish huff of air out eir nose. Kris noticed they were a sparse couple feet apart and he noticed that eir eyebrows were completely shaven off, and ey had a half inch of dark roots between eir scalp and eir vibrant green hair. Eir glasses were rounded and unflattering, but somehow these eccentricities did little to make em less intimidating. Ey was taller than Kris, probably four or five inches on his six foot even, and when ey took a step closer this became even more obvious.

“How does a practice spar sound?” ey asked. “To warm up. Get everyone’s blood pumpin'.”

“I don't spar,” Kris said. “But I’ll fight you.”

Park’s fist collided with Kris's cheekbone in lieu of a verbal response. Kris rolled with it as best he could and dodged its twin, ducking down to try to kick Park's legs it from under em. Eir stance was stone solid, halting Kris’s momentum and disturbing his balance instead of the other way around. Park reached down to eir side and took hold of Kris’s ankle, hoisting it up to shoulder height so Kris had to support his head and shoulders off the ground with his arms, dropping his jacket. He kicked out with his free leg but Park took it in eir other hand, stronger than Kris had imagined. The both of them went still all at once, Kris panting upside down and Park holding his feet.

There was assorted snickering from the crowd. Kris felt his cheeks warm.

“This is awkward,” Park said, something like a grin in eir voice. Kris couldn’t imagine em smiling, gaze fixed instead on his disheveled reflection in eir patent leather boots.

Ey threw his feet to one side and Kris hit the ground hard, wincing. He didn’t let himself lay there and stare at the ceiling long, no matter how enticing the thought may have seemed.

“Get up!” ey barked while Kris rose from his knees, uninjured and barely winded. “You’re terrible at this. Should’ve taken the other option, eh?”

“Fuck off,” Kris spat, eloquent as ever. In truth, he’d considered going back on his choice to live too many times to count, but every time he had he’d heard JC’s voice in his ear telling him to wait it out. _“Don’t do anything stupid.”_

Park held out eir arms in a half-shrug and Kris got an eyeful of that grin - condescending as anything and dangerous as nothing else. Kris snarled, baring his teeth like a defensive animal, reluctant to make the first move.

“Watch close, kids,” Park said to the room at large, never taking eir steel blue eyes off Kris. “This is going to end quickly.”

Kris huffed and closed the distance, aiming a punch for Park’s solar plexus with his right fist, his other hand going to grab the back of eir neck. Ey only seemed startled by Kris’s sudden start for an instant, but it was long enough - Kris yanked em down by the skull and kneed em in the face, nose breaking with a sharp crack. Kris noticed blood on his jeans when he let Park go.

Ey growled something feral and there was blood on eir teeth, too, when they made some sort of brash maneuver. Ey was almost clumsy in eir rage and Kris ducked out of the way easily before ey could get a hold on him. Park stumbled and Kris took the opportunity, grabbing Park’s right arm from behind and yanking it by the wrist until eir hand was between eir shoulderblades, shoulder pulled taut. Ey grunted, other hand going up and over to grab a fistful of Kris’s hair, but again Kris avoided the move. He took hold of Park’s left arm, holding it still while he stretched the right one further and further. Park struggled, jerking about and growling, and Kris pushed em to the ground to pin eir lower back with his knee.

They sat, panting, for a long moment - Park knowing ey’d been defeated, probably, and Kris wondering how much further he could push this. A- a self-destructive impulse made him take the chance and, putting as much of his weight onto Park as necessary to keep em still, he continued stretching Park’s arm. Park gasped, eyes squeezed shut in pain and kicking out uselessly, trying to jostle Kris enough to get him off of em, but Kris was unmoved. The room was dead silent aside from Park’s protests, the thumping of eir boots on the ground, and hushed, frightened whispering from the crowd. Kris couldn’t hear any of it, laser-focused on-

Park screamed as eir shoulder popped out and Kris felt a wave of satisfaction run over him at hurting someone he’d _meant_ to hurt. He smiled and let go, stepping back and straightening up. Park panted and rolled onto eir back, staring at the ceiling then at Kris with something like surprise.

Ey held up eir good hand and after a moment of hesitation, Kris helped em up.

“Pull a stunt like that again and I’ll shoot you myself,” ey said with none of the heat Kris expected. “I’m moving you to the expert class. Go back to your room, be back at eight tonight. Understood?”

Kris paused, sweeping his gaze over the room of shell shocked teenagers to land back on Park, cradling eir shoulder in eir other hand. He swallowed his disappointment and nodded. “Yes, si- Admiral.”

Park rolled eir eyes at the slip, but just nodded toward the door. The crowd once more spread like the red sea and he was gone.


	14. "It's a passion."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretty much an info dump with a familiar face. I'm sorry.

_TWO MONTHS LATER_

Kris had thought calling the training warehouse “the schoolhouse” had been a little more metaphorical, with training classes consisting of firearm use and combat, but as his training progressed he found the term was a lot more literal than expected. He had classes on the Court’s computer networks, on codes and signals and first aid. There had been a seminar on choosing codenames where he’d “come out” in a way as Hazard, much to the excitement and fright of the other newbies. Only the High Court went by their real names, every other Court member assigned a codename. Roman (officially “Spymaster Gregoriy Roman,” and a member of the High Court) had tried to get him to choose something aside from Hazard - suggesting “Cobalt” for his eye color,  or “Hotshot” for his temper - but in the end Kris decided to keep his old name, tape or no. Roman had made it clear he wouldn’t be allowed to use his tape, as masks were meant to disguise, not indicate identity. That had been hard to swallow, but keeping his name would be enough.

On top of classes was mandated exercise outside of training, and Kris was lucky enough to have a work out room in the safehouse he was staying in with fourteen other recruits and Park's second in command, Barrage, who served as a sort of supervisor.

No two Court safehouses were the same, mostly because it wasn't easy to find dozens of identical houses in what the Court called  _el Reino_  - literally “the kingdom,” and the word used to describe all the area under Court control. In truth, it encompassed most of La Sierra, so the term seemed a little redundant, but there still remained places outside of Court control, called  _las Afueras,_  or “the outskirts,” consisting of a good chunk of the downtown area and a couple slums and suburbs.

It was late when Kris snuck out of his shared bedroom after hours of lying awake. Most days he was too exhausted from training to be properly haunted come bedtime, but he’d spent today honest-to-god _studying_ for a test on Court structure, all the divisions and their locations and leaders and functions, which was _boring_ but not _tiring_. When he’d laid down on his bunk that evening, the moment he’d closed his eyes he’d seen Andrea’s look of betrayal, heard Cam scream, _“What did you do!?”_ as if from a thousand miles away, or as if right inside his skull. No matter of shutting his eyes tighter or tossing and turning could force the memory from his mind, so he’d given up on sleeping and decided to try and exhaust himself first. He hadn’t worked out much before joining the Court, considering his Hazard games to be all the exercise he needed, but something about working himself until he wanted to pass out had rapidly become appealing after the December heist.

He breathed deeply, in and out with the movements of the bar, the overly-tight scar tissue of his shoulders stretching almost unpleasantly. He wasn’t sure how many reps in he was, but from the way sweat was dripping down his face and soaking into his shirt, he’d been at it a long while.

“Hazard?”

Kris startled, nearly dropping the bar in his shock. He caught it before it could crush the breath out of him and panted, gathering himself.

“Ah shit, sorry!” The intruder jogged across the room and helped him set the bar back on the rack, eyes glinting apologetic behind his glasses.

“Ja- Bandit?” Kris sat up, surprised to see him. He hadn’t seen JC or Cam since before he'd started training. “You scared the shit outta me.”

JC winced with a sheepish look, sitting on an empty bench across from Kris, giving him his space. “Sorry, dude, I was just, uh. Surprised.” Kris pulled up the bottom of his tank top to wipe some of the sweat off his face and JC followed the movement with his eyes. “I didn’t know you were assigned here.”

“I am,” Kris said. “What’re you here for so late?” A glance at the wall clock by the door told him it was nearly 2 am - not exactly regular visiting hours.

“Heist Crew stuff with Barrage,” JC said with a shrug. “Nothing I can tell you about.” He looked around the room as if he hadn’t seen it before. “What are _you_ doing up so late?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Kris admitted.

“What for?”

Kris shrugged. “I’ve got a lot on my mind. Andrea, training, these fucking classes. Haven’t felt stress like this since high school.”

JC laughed, the first time Kris had seen him smile, and he felt something rough inside him go soft. He ignored it. “Maybe I could help you out? I was top in my class.”

“In high school or in training?”

“Training. I didn’t finish high school.”

Kris nearly said the same, but- technically, he _had_ graduated. He just hadn’t gone to the ceremony.

(He wondered what his mom had done with his diploma. Threw it out, probably.)

Instead, he nodded. “Yeah, that’d be great.” He didn’t think he needed the help, but seeing a familiar face - and a friendly one at that - was nicer than he’d anticipated.

JC smiled again and Kris looked away. “What’re you having trouble with?”

Kris raised his eyebrows, looking back at him. “What, right now?”

He wasn’t sure if he imagined JC’s dark cheeks going a little red or not. “I mean, you’re not doing anything right now, right?”

“I guess not.” Kris shrugged. “It’s, uh. Court structure,” he chose mostly at random. “I have a test this week and there’s just so much shit to know.”

JC nodded. “Yeah, it’s a bit complex, especially when you gotta know who’s in charge and the bases.”

“Exactly,” Kris said, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees to look at his hands. “I take it you know it by heart?”

“Have to,” JC said, like it was no big deal. “Plus exact locations and how to get to all of ‘em, but you don’t need to know all that.”

“Because you’re the driver?”

“And pilot,” he said. “I have to know how to get everywhere. Only places I don’t know are High Court secrets.”

“You can fly?” Kris was impressed.

JC nodded. “Anything that moves, I can probably take somewhere. Cars, trucks, planes, helicopters, boats. It’s a passion, I guess.”

Kris was impressed. “That’s fuckin’ awesome,” he said, and there was the redness again.

JC smiled a little, almost shyly. “Thanks. It’s what I do here, when I’m not heisting with Wrecker. I’m a Contractor.”

Kris wracked his mind for what he knew about the Contractors - Court members with exceptional skills, hired out on contracts to work outside the Court. Assassins, hackers, bodyguards, and apparently pilots. “Based in the North Avenue safehouse, right?” he asked, and JC nodded.

“Headed by?”

“Warhead- no, Spectacle,” he said after a moment of thought. “I keep getting the Cavalry and Contractors mixed up.”

“They’re pretty similar,” JC said understandingly. “Both the highest ranking division in their branch. Which is which?”

So they were studying now. Alright. “Contractors is Intelligence, headed by Spectacle, based on North Avenue. They’re- they’re, uh, ‘talented individuals’ for hire by contract, hence the name.” JC nodded for him to go on. “The Cavalry is Military, headed by Warhead, and based on, um... Underwood?”

“Hawthorne,” JC corrected. “Two blocks over. Underwood is a Streets command center.”

“Shit, right.” Kris frowned. “Cavalry is- is pretty much the Queen’s private police, right? They shut down any crime she doesn’t like.”

“Such as?”

“Human trafficking rings, other gangs’ drug distribution, child pornography. Stuff like that.”

JC grinned. “Right. And what about the Streets?”

Kris shook his head. “Too many bases to list, but Underwood is the most important. Headed by Bloodhound, Roman’s second in command. Same with Windows.”

“And their functions?”

“Streets are the smaller front-gangs that do the Court’s drug and firearm dealin’,” Kris said. “I actually got my Hazard guns from a Streets gang, y’know. They tried to get me to join up.”

JC furrowed his brow. “You bought guns from the Court? There’s no record-”

“I wasn’t taped up,” he said, and JC ‘oh’-ed. “It was a year ago, they prob’ly thought I was some petty criminal.”

JC nodded slowly, frowning just slightly. He shook it off. “And the Windows?”

Kris was thankful for the subject change. He may have given the Court his name, but he wasn’t exactly keen on sharing his past, no matter how recent or inconsequential. “Spies scoutin’ out heist locations, or gettin’ in on white collar crime from the inside,” Kris recited. “Most important base is on Brewer Street, across from the bank.” He hadn’t known it at the time, but he’d spent a couple hours there with the Heist Crew (minus Andrea) and Park, the day before the heist, familiarizing themselves with the outside through the tinted front windows and the inside through the map laid out by the Windows agent assigned to the heist. She’d been working at the bank for over a year in preparation.

JC paused. “And the Heist Crew?”

The last major division. “It was you and Wrecker and Attore,” Kris said, not meeting JC’s eyes. “Until Hazard-” He choked off. “Headed by Park emself with direct assistance by Roman. The most dangerous and intricate operations the Court pulls, and they’re for publicity, of all things. Damn ballsy.”

“Sounds like your kind of operation, huh?” JC said.

“I guess,” Kris said. “Though I'm sure as hell gonna miss the, uh,  _spontaneity_ bein' Hazard gave me.”

“I get that,” JC acquiesced. “Do you know what you want to do after training, then?”

Kris shrugged. “Does it matter what I want?”

“Of course,” JC said, and Kris looked up to catch his indignant look. “Dude, I was talking to Barrage and he said that with how you’ve been doing, you’re on track to have first pick.”

The best new recruits got to pick where they were assigned, within reason - Kris knew that. He hadn’t thought he’d been doing that well, especially after dislocating Park’s arm and that time he nearly did the same to Roman when he’d seen the man flirting with what had looked like the most uninterested eighteen year old girl in all of California. Kris had taken two steps in their direction when the girl had decked Roman so hard she’d shattered his glasses and broke one arm off the frames. Still, rather than admit he’d gotten his bloody nose from a teenage girl, Roman had written Kris up for the event and had been giving him a hard time ever since. The girl's name had been Menace, and when she’d thanked him for taking the wrap without contest, she’d gone on to threaten that if he ever tried to save her again, she’d castrate him with a fire axe.

“I dunno,” Kris said, shaking off the memory. “I haven’t thought about it.”

“Well, what are you good at?”

“The Hazard thing, I guess,” he said.

“So you’re a terrorist,” JC said, with none of the sort of fearful hatred most people would have said that with. Something about being a career criminal desensitized you to that kind of shit, Kris supposed. “You could be a Contractor - people are always looking for terrorists.”

Kris pulled a face of distaste. “People who look for terrorists have agendas. I don’t wanna get caught up in that.” He paused. “What does Wrecker do, other than heist?”

“They’re in the Cavalry,” JC said. “Head their own squad and everything.”

Kris supposed that fit them. “I might be good at that.”

“Yeah, probably,” JC said. “And then there’s always general intelligence. Tailing targets, staging info drops, infiltrating events that Windows can't. That’s what Attore did.”

Kris grinned a little wryly. Andrea had never mentioned what he did with the Court aside from his lessons. “He was working and training at the same time?”

“ESL recruits spend extra time in training,” JC said. “Being bilingual is an asset we definitely utilize. It was harder for Attore, though - he had to learn English through Spanish, which was already his second language. No one here speaks Italian.”

“Are you?” Kris asked. “Bilingual?”

JC shook his head. “I can do accents but I only speak English. Wrecker speaks Mandarin, though. They grew up bilingual, thank goodness, because if none of us speak Italian, you know no one speaks Chinese.” He shifted his weight, crossing an ankle over his knee. “And you?”

“Took some French in high school,” he said. “That was ten years ago, though.”

“God, you’re old,” JC joked with a grin, and Kris rolled his eyes.

“Shut up, kid,” he said grinning right back. He yawned, the hour and his workout catching up with him all at once. “Ain’t it past your bedtime?”

JC laughed and looked at the clock. They’d been talking for over an hour and he looked surprised, though Kris didn’t blame him. It hadn’t felt that long.

“I should get going,” JC said after a pause, looking more than reluctant. “I- Wrecker’s probably trying to break into the safehouse’s drug lockup. Or already has.” He stood and stretched his legs. “Good luck on your test.”

Kris stood as well, ready to head to bed. “Thanks,” he said. “Have a good one, Bandit.”

“You, too, Hazard.”

Kris followed him out the door where they went their separate ways - JC to the front door, and Kris up the stairs to his room. His nightmares let him rest another night.


	15. "And you killed him."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris fails a test.

_FOUR MONTHS LATER_

“Do you think about Andrea a lot?”

Kris froze, then pulled a face. “Jace, what the hell does that have to do with the lesson?”

“You’re doing fine,” JC said, and Kris could practically hear his eyeroll. “I’m at _least_ a block behind you. Answer the question.”

This was one of the last classes Kris was taking, three weeks out from graduation from training, on evasive driving, taught by the legendary Bandit. Over six months had passed since December, and not once had JC asked about Andrea, after the first days following the heist.

“Yeah,” Kris admitted. It was easy to be honest with JC, and Kris considered him to be the only Court member he trusted. He still considered the Court a ‘them’ as opposed to a ‘we,’ despite all of his time with them. He wondered if he’d ever consider himself a part of it, but hoped he wouldn’t. The more he learned about the Court and discovered it was more a well-oiled machine than a mob, the more he hated it. He missed the chaos and spontaneity of being Hazard. “Yeah, I still have nightmares. I don’t like to talk about it.”

JC’s voice was annoyed and tinny on the other side of the walkie talkie. “You don’t know if you like talking about it! You never have!”

“I don’t like gettin’ bit by snakes, either, and I’ve never been bitten by a snake,” Kris intoned, making two sudden turns.

“Those are not the same things, Kris.” JC sighed. “I think about him, too. He was like the kid brother I never had.”

“How long did you know him?” Kris asked.

“Two years,” JC said. “Met him - it was actually very dramatic. Cam and I were brought to _El Palacio,_ the Queen’s base. Knocked out and dumped in the back of a truck to get there, like always. He was having a lesson with the Queen when we were about to meet him. Then we heard him scream in Italian, and then Perez came out of the room with blood all over her hands and told us to go in. She’d just cut off his finger for a punishment.”

“What the fuck?!” Kris exclaimed. “What’d he do?”

“I don’t remember,” JC said. “Hit the Queen on accident, I think. Kid was too much of an investment to kill, she said. But yeah, I sent Cam out to get a first aid kit and I patched him up. It was quite, uh, memorable.”

Kris whislted. “Damn sounds like it.” He paused to take another turn, catching sight of JC’s black SUV in his rearview and cursing under his breath. “Once he had to patch me up after I got shot.”

“Really?”

Kris nodded, forgetting that JC couldn’t see him for a moment. “Yeah,” he said quickly. “I pulled a Hazard game in broad daylight like a jackass and got got by the cops. When I got home I was half delirious, chokin’ on blood and suffocatin’ in my tape. Kid had to unwrap me and patch me up.”

“He knew what you looked like?”

“Yeah. And my name.”

JC paused for a long time. Like, a _long_ time. An uncomfortably long time.

“Jace?” Kris asked, stuck at a red light and scanning all his mirrors for his tail. “You there, bud?”

“So Andrea knew your name, what you looked like, and where you lived,” JC said. Kris frowned.

“Yeah, and?”

“And you killed him.”

Kris flinched. “Jace-”

“I know it was an accident,” JC said, sounding tired all of a sudden. “That’s just- that’s quite the coincidence, don’t you think? That doesn’t look good.”

“Well, I guess it’s a good thing you’re the only one who knows he knew, huh?” Kris said, lowly, more than a little angry at the unsaid accusation. “I never wanted the kid dead. I cared about him, and I trusted him. That’s why he knew. I killed him because I was careless and an idiot.” He paused, something like emotion stopping up his throat. “I considered him a friend, though I never got to tell him as much.”

“I’m sorry, Kris,” JC said, gently. “You’re right. I believe you. Sorry.”

Kris rolled his eyes. “Yeah, whatever. Don’t tell Cam. They already hate me.”

“Yeah, okay.” A pause. "What does it matter to you if they hate you more? Have you even  _seen_ them since the heist?"

“No,” Kris admitted. He didn't fancy seeing them again, as big of an advocate for his execution as they'd been. “But- I’m considering asking Park about joining the Heist Crew. It’d be hard to work with ‘em with the current amount of hate, let alone more.”

JC gasped, and when he spoke again Kris could hear his smile, could imagine the way he lit up with excitement. The image warmed Kris from the inside. “Dude, forreal?!”

“Forreal.”

“I’ll put in a recommendation if you do!” JC exclaimed. “You’ll need it, especially 'cause when Cam finds out they’re gonna flip their shit and probably try to fight Park.”

“It’s not as hard as it might seem, if you catch em off guard,” Kris said. “Tell ‘em they have my blessing. _Please_ fight Park.”

JC laughed. “Not everyone is _you,_ Kris. I’m pretty sure the only other person I know who’d stand a chance against Park is Perez.”

“Do you think I could beat Perez?”

“Dude, you’re incredible, but I’m pretty sure Perez could take on the whole damn Court at once,” JC said. “She’s the Knight Protector for a reason, Kris.”

Kris took the last turn, breaking into a grin when he saw the safehouse he’d decided on. “Yeah, you’re probably right,” he said as he parked on the side of the street and, quietly as possible, got out of the car and shut the door behind him so the walkie wouldn’t pick it up. He had his head bowed as he faux-casually walked to the door and inside, then broke a smile.

“Took you long enough.”

Kris jumped, turning and- _fuck,_ JC was there, sat comfortably in the front room of the safehouse with a _drink_ of all things. His smile disappeared.

“How long have you been here?” Kris sighed, frustrated he’d failed _again._ The objective was to lose JC long enough to get to any safehouse - if he got there first, it was a fail. Kris had taken this test three times already and didn’t have it in him to act pissed off anymore.

“Two minutes, thirty seconds,” JC said, sipping on his drink - a straw stuck into a soda can, no doubt spiked with something. The walkie talkie was on the coffee table by his feet. “Better than last time.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Kris grumbled and JC laughed. JC stood and clapped Kris on the shoulder, lingering a little too long, but all of JC’s touches seemed to be that way. Kris was sure he was just reading into it. “Lemme get something to drink before we go again.”

“I’m sure you’ll do it this time,” JC said, letting his hand fall and calling after Kris on his way to the kitchen. “Fifth time’s the charm, right?”


	16. "Thank you, Admiral."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris graduates from Court training.

_ONE MONTH LATER_

Graduation was rowdier than expected.

Though, really, he wasn’t all that surprised - three dozen recruits and another two dozen various other court members packed into the biggest room at the back of the schoolhouse with Park and Roman at the front of the room on a sort of makeshift stage. It reminded Kris of the Queen’s in the throne room, the same thin wooden top and exposed supports underneath, no stairs to speak of. Everyone seemed to be talking all at once, a dull roar of noise with no meaning. Kris was starting to get a headache from it all.

“Settle down!” Roman called from the front of the room, a bemused grin on his lips, like always. He always seemed to be amused by some private joke. In a matter of moments the room had gone silent, seven months of training showing itself in quick obedience. “If you’re here, that means you’re now a fully-fledged member of the Court.” He raised a hand as a couple people began clapping, silencing them. “No applause. Not all of you deserve it. Most of you are weak and cowardly, only now you can throw a punch and shoot a gun.”

“Don’t worry, by the end of Infantry training, I’ll’ve beat it out of you,” Park cut in with a grin that seemed all too excited about the prospect. Infantry was the lowest ranking division of the Military branch, and the whole Court, hundreds of people (mostly younger members) too stupid to work tech support for Intelligence and too weak or unskilled to work anything else. Most Court members were infantry.

“This ceremony is for those who excelled,” Roman continued. “Future Cavalry and Contractors, security and general Intelligence - real assets to the Court. Only a dozen of you are of a high enough caliber, and a dozen spots are open. Six security, four Cavalry, two Intelligence. Those who placed highest in training will get first choice. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” a chorus of voices said, distinctly more sober than before Roman had begun speaking.

“Some of you have the option to be Contractors,” Park chimed in. “You’ll be told when you get up here, and what we believe your specialty should be. You can decide whether or not that’s something you’re interested in now, or at any time during your time with the Court.”

“We’ll call up the top twelve of you from last to first,” Roman said, gesturing toward the clipboard Park was holding onto. “If your name is called you’ll come up and, given your options, choose where you want to be assigned. This decision is final for your first year, and after that you may ask for reassignment.” He cleared his throat. “Admiral?”

Park nodded, peering through eir glasses at the pages before em. “Number twelve, Wraith.”

Two girls whooped in excitement and a young boy - no older than Andrea, and weaker looking - nervously picked his way through the crowd. Park held out a hand to help him up when he struggled to jump onto the stage, looking annoyed about it.

“Let me guess - general Intelligence?” Park said, and the boy nodded meekly. His hair was long and honey blonde, curling around his ears and- was that a barrette? Park looked down at the clipboard and raised eir, uh, eyebrow skin. “You’ve been selected to be a Contractor. ‘Spy, interrogator, and forger.’ Do you wanna think about it?”

“I’ll do it,” the boy said, sounding a little more confident than he looked.

Park looked impressed. “Welcome to the Court, Wraith.”

“Thank you, Admiral.” He hopped down from the stage delicately and rejoined the girls who’d shouted; Kris recognized Menace’s pink hair and sidecut, but not the other girl’s long black dreadlocks.

Next was a couple guys who both chose general security, then Menace, who chose Cavalry and was offered a Contractor position - ‘interrogator, arsonist, and bodyguard,’ - which she accepted. Kris zoned out, missing the names and assignments of the next four, only paying attention when Wraith and Menace’s other friend, called ‘Fracture,’ was called up. She chose security and was, like her friends, offered a Contractor position as an ‘interrogator and bodyguard.’ All three of them were interrogators, which Kris wondered at for a moment before the next name was called.

“Number two, Trigger.”

A big guy - well over six foot and huge, built like a brick shithouse and intimidating - was on the stage next. Kris recognized him from the advanced combat class, all brute force and pent-up rage. Outside of class, though, he was almost effeminate, and even from here Kris could see his baby blue fingernails.

“Where do you wanna go?” Park asked. “All of the Security positions are taken, but if that’s your choice the lowest ranking one will be reassigned. Cavalry and Intelligence are open.”

“Cavalry,” Trigger said with a resolute nod.

“And you have a Contractor offer, too - how does ‘bodyguard,’ sound?”

“Just bodyguard?” Everyone else who’d gotten an offer - just Wraith, Menace, and Fracture - had had multiple specialties.

“Trust me, big guy, you’ll get enough contracts on that alone,” Park said. “Yes or no?”

Trigger shrugged his massive shoulders. “Yeah, I guess so.” Then he hopped down. Still, he’d said more than Fracture, who had said ‘Security,’ and ‘Sure,’ before getting off the stage.

There was a longer pause, the tension in the room amping up, but Kris sighed. He hadn’t thought he’d placed at the top, but he’d known he’d done well enough to avoid Infantry. He’d kind of been hoping to be toward the bottom or middle of the list, if just to avoid the attention, but apparently not.

“And number one, and the top ranking recruit from your class - Hazard.”

Park nearly smiled at him when he jumped up onto the stage, feeling everyone in the room’s fascinated eyes on him. He’d seen this coming - he’d done better than he’d expected in the classes (with JC’s help), had more experience than the whole room combined in hand-to-hand combat, firearm use, hostage situations, and evading police, and no-doubt his criminal history as Hazard played a part in his ranking. He wondered if anyone else in the top twelve had a history that had helped their rank, too.

“The only spot left is Intelligence, but I’m sure you-”

“I’ll take it,” Kris said, cutting Park off. He was supposed to be taking Andrea’s place, right?

The only other division that had attracted him was the Cavalry, but not enough to take it from Menace. The kid earned it.

“You sure?” Park asked, pulling a face, and Kris nodded. He’d done okay in the Intelligence part of his training, decent with computers and good at improv, so he didn’t doubt he wouldn’t be terrible working under Roman. He glanced at Roman to gauge his reaction, but he just had that stupid, inscrutable smile he always did.

“Alright. You have a Contractor offer as a ‘terrorist.’ Do you accept?”

Just a terrorist. Kris shook his head, the only one to turn down a Contractor offer, and took a step toward the edge of the stage.

Park cleared eir throat. “You have another offer.”

Kris frowned and turned, furrowing his brow. “What?”

“I’m offering you a spot on the Heist Crew,” Park said, a cock to eir jaw that dared anyone to question em. Kris caught Roman’s surprised look and guessed that was why. “A second chance.”

Whispering broke out among the crowd, but Kris tuned it out. _‘A second chance.’_ A chance to make up for his mistake, to atone for Andrea’s death, in a way. He was supposed to be taking Andrea’s place, right?

Plus, he liked the idea of continuing to work with JC.

“Alright,” he said, nodding. Then: “Thank you, Admiral.”


	17. "You're not replacing him."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Heist Crew spend some quality time together.

When Kris saw Cam next, they had some sort of ugly flat-top military haircut and a steely glare.

“I can’t believe Bandit didn’t fucking tell me you two were conspiring,” they said, loudly to be heard over the music. One of the new recruit safehouses had been given permission to throw a post-graduation party, and JC - who had appeared out of nowhere with Cam on one arm and congratulations on his lips the second Kris got out of the schoolhouse - had insisted the three of them go. Presently, however, he seemed to have disappeared, leaving Kris alone with the last person he wanted to be alone with.

“We wasn’t ‘conspirin',’” Kris said with a frown. He ached for something to drink, more for the excuse not to talk than anything, but everything in the house seemed to be spiked with something or other. “We’re friends. And Park made the offer on eir own.”

“Well, you should’ve said _no,”_ Cam insisted, swallowing a great mouthful of whatever concoction was in their plastic cup. “And Intelligence, too? You’re not And- Attore.” Their frown impossibly deepened. “You’re not replacing him.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Kris allowed, shrugging. “But I’m not changin’ my mind. If anythin’, your shitty attitude’s eggin’ me on. Best get used to me now, kid.”

“Don’t call me that!” they snapped, then chugged the rest of their drink and rested their head on the kitchen island they were sat at.

Kris ignored them, scanning what little of the crowd he could see from his vantage point for JC. He could see Menace and her friends piled on top of each other in an armchair in the living room, and Trigger stood by the alcohol, but no JC. As he watched, a couple of kids stumbled over to try and get another drink only to be turned away by Trigger with a hard look and a crossing of muscular arms. Scary as he looked, Kris decided he liked Trigger. He seemed like a good guy.

“Hey, Hazard!”

Kris turned when his codename was called in time to see Menace dragging Wraith and Fracture by the hands. He grinned a little in greeting.

“Uh, hey, Menace,” he said, then addressed all three of them. “Congrats on joinin’ the Contractors.”

Menace grinned and Wraith flushed, looking at his sneakers. This close, Kris could see the kid definitely had a barrette holding back his bangs and that, like Trigger, his nails were painted. Menace’s were too, but where hers was black and chipped to hell, Wraith’s were  pink and shiny.

“Thanks!” she said. “Fracture wanted me to ask-” The girl in question elbowed Menace hard in the arm with a glare. “-if you’re actually, y’know. _Hazard._ Like, the real one.”

“I heard he hates the Court,” Fracture said, so quietly Kris almost couldn’t hear her. “And he killed that Intelligence kid. The Queen probably killed him.”

“But he’s got the accent!” Menace said, like they’d been having this argument for a while.

“There is more than one southern person in the world, Menace.”

“I’m the real Hazard,” Kris said, cutting off the argument. “Joinin’ the Court was my punishment for killin’ Attore.”

“What?!” Menace exclaimed. “That’s-”

“Surprisingly lenient,” Fracture said, distrust coloring her tone. “Why not kill you?”

Kris shrugged, but Wraith spoke up before he could. “He’s useful and already has a reputation,” he said, thoughtfully. “I mean, how good does it make her sound that she’s got Hazard on a leash?”

Kris bristled at the wording, but the kid was right. Menace and Fracture nodded slowly, appeased. “I guess that makes sense,” Menace said, then nodded resolutely. “It was really cool to meet you, Hazard!”

“You too,” Kris said, but she was already gone, dragging the others with her into the crowd. He had a distinct feeling that, though he’d _definitely_  been speaking to someone, no actual conversation took place.

 _“‘The real Hazard,’”_ Cam said, mockingly, without lifting their head off their arms. They snorted and Kris glared at them. “What are you, some sorta celebrity?”

Kris shrugged. “I guess so,” he said. “Not on purpose.”

Cam snorted again. “You parade around La Sierra like a goddamn supervillain in a costume. That’s not on purpose?”

“I’ve got a flair for the dramatic,” Kris intoned.

“You and Attore've got _that_ in common, at least,” they said, turning their head onto its side to look up at Kris blearily. “Still won’t replace him.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

JC materialized at that moment, clapping a hand on Kris’s shoulder in a familiar gesture with a cup in hand. “You seem to have caused a commotion in the living room,” he said.

“Have I?”

JC nodded sagely. “Dude, you never told me you were the _real_ Hazard!”

Cam laughed, sitting back upright. “Holy _fuck,_ Hazard! I can’t believe I’ve been talking to a _criminal!”_

Kris cracked a smile and JC choked on a sip of his drink, laughing and going a little off-balance. He wobbled toward Kris and put his arm the rest of the way around Kris’s shoulders to stabilize himself. Kris felt his cheeks warm and wished he could blame it on alcohol.

“Hey, ‘re you two ready to get out of here?” JC said and from this close Kris could smell alcohol and something fruity on his breath.

“Where to?” Cam asked, already sliding off their bar stool to their feet. Kris followed their lead, sort of feeling the third wheel to the established twosome. JC let his arm fall, fingers skimming Kris’s back for a moment and Kris tried to repress his chills.

“I dunno,” JC said. “I’m tired of trying to talk to drunk teenagers.”

“We could go to my apartment,” Kris suggested. “Barrage gave me my keys back after graduation and said they’d kept it for me.”

“Why?” Cam pulled a face.

Kris shrugged. “I dunno, but it beats sharing a safehouse with a bunch of strangers.”

JC and Cam shared a look, then JC nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Lead the way, Hazard.”

\--

The Court sure had kept his apartment, but not very well.

It reeked of dust and neglect, of laundry he’d meant to do after the heist but (obviously) never got to, of stale air and water damage. Kris flicked on the light and ignored the instinctive embarrassment at having _company_ in this mess (an instinct that inexplicably had his mother’s voice).

“What a shithole,” Cam declared, throwing themself onto the couch and coughing in the dust cloud.

“That’s what seven months of neglect does to a place, jerk,” Kris said, tossing his keys on the table and letting JC close the door behind them. “Your ass ain’t complainin’.”

“This couch is shitty and I’m dying,” Cam said, and though they were mostly blocked from Kris’s view by the back of said couch, he watched them dramatically throw about their limbs.

“You’re a terrible house guest,” JC said, making a beeline for the TV and Kris’s video game collection. “Whoa, Kris, these are ancient!”

Kris frowned. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”

“A _360?_ Who even has these anymore?”

“Uh, I do?” Kris bristled. “Do you wanna play somethin’?”

JC shook his head. “I’m way more drunk than I look, I would just embarrass myself.” He straightened back up and gestured for Cam to move. They lifted their legs straight in the air and JC sat in the space they vacated, then they dropped their legs back down in his lap. “I’ll watch you play, though.”

“You just wanna watch?” Kris walked over to pick through the games, settling on the worn out box set of a space opera he was particularly fond of.

JC nodded while he put it in the tray, putting away the game already there - that cooperative puzzle game he’d played with Andrea, what felt like years ago, now. “Yeah, we’ll provide color commentary. Won’t we, Cam?”

“‘Course,” Cam agreed. “I can’t wait to shit all over this game. And you.” They belched, not bothering to cover their mouth or anything. “D’you got any booze?”

“I don’t drink,” Kris said disapprovingly. “There’s water on tap. I need to restock.”

“Do you think if you bribe the pizza guy enough he’ll pick me up a six pack?” Cam asked JC, kicking him to indicate who they were talking to.

JC shrugged, pulling out his phone. “Only one way to find out.”

The console booted up with a dated ‘swoosh’ and crescendo of strings, and Kris settled in on the floor by JC’s feet, feeling truly at home for the first time in a long time.


	18. "I have to go after him."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Heist Crew do a job.

_ONE YEAR LATER_

“Haz, hurry the fuck up!” Cam shouted, hair plastered to their face with sweat. They were panting, hands on the heated handrail at the top of the stairwell.

“I’m tryin’,” Kris panted back, or maybe he whined. His trouble breathing was from more than the smoke, terror and exhaustion taking their toll. “At least we know Bandit got his job done right.” He almost wished he hadn’t – the sprinklers he’d disabled would be more than welcome right now. Oh, god, there was fire _everywhere._ The heat made his skin bubble and crawl under his shirt. They had done their jobs perfectly.

Cam nodded, and Kris caught up, legs aching and sweat beading down his face. The fire was catching better than expected, and the heat was near unbearable as they tore their way upstairs. The building, some too-tall corporate thing downtown, was evacuated after someone set off the fire alarm. It had been declared a false alarm until Kris, Cam, and JC had broken in with gas cans and orders from Park to start the blaze.

There was no one inside to burn but the three of them. This was a statement, not an attack, though it felt like it was anyway.

On the highest floor, Kris could almost pretend it was safe, and that the smoke wasn’t following them up the stairway and that the heat wasn’t making his skin blister. He could almost breathe calmly, but the blood red emergency lights and the smell of smoke were still overbearing. He must have been bright scarlet all over, and Cam didn’t look any better. Together they found the final stairway and Cam shot out the emergency locking mechanism with their shotgun, face visibly panicked. They kicked it open, and Kris sighed with relief.

“Thank fuck, let’s get out of here,” he said, pushing past Cam and taking the stairs two at a time. Over the blood in his ears and labored breathing, it took him a second to realize he was going up alone. He turned around – Cam hadn’t moved, looking around behind them.

“Jace should’ve met up with us already,” they said. “I mean, Bandit. Fuck. He shouldn’t be so late.”

Kris hadn’t even realized JC wasn’t there, too wrapped up in the fire. The idea that their teammate- that their _friend_ was still in the blaze below made his stomach churn. “I- Sh-should we go back down?” His fear was audible in his voice.

Cam shook their head, hesitant. “I- I can’t, I'm too small, I’m gonna dehydrate. I need to check on the helicopter.”

Kris could hear the unspoken request. He clenched his hands to stop their shaking, his heart pounding double time. “I- Wrecker, you know I-”

“Yeah, your pyrophobic ass couldn’t save him anyway.” Cam glared at him like it was his own fault, then shoved their sweaty hair out of their face. Kris noticed their hands were shaking too. “I guess we’ll have to trust him.”

He was prepared to agree, to run up those stairs and get in the helicopter and wait for their pilot to come sweep them away, but the thought that JC was trapped below, maybe dying, maybe dead, terrified him. He didn’t think about Andrea anymore – it had been nearly  _two years,_ now – but the memory of losing a teammate and friend made him sick to his stomach with anxiety and fear. JC was down there, somewhere in the twenty-ish stories below, and Kris had to find him.

“I have to go after him,” he said, at length, not even looking at Cam but beyond them. They looked at him like he’d gone insane.

“Dude, if you have, like, an _episode_ down there, it’s just me and a helicopter I can’t drive on the top of a building on fire!” they said, like it was obvious. “I can’t let you go down there, Hazard.”

“And I can’t let Bandit burn alive!” He hadn’t meant to shout, let alone roar, but Cam flinched and backed up a couple steps. He jumped down the stairs and started off past them, fixed on his decision. “If I have to burn to save him, so be it.” He scoffed. “And I don’t have ‘ _episodes.’_ _”_

“Yeah, just nightmares where you wake up screaming,” Cam scoffed right back as Kris went down the stairwell, swallowing a quip about their pesky habit of smoking indoors in the middle of the night, which sure as hell didn't _help_.

The stairway going down was worse than going up, smoke thickening and flames licking their way up the walls. There was a great creaking like the whole damn building shifting in its foundation, crouching down on its haunches, and Kris’s stomach lurched in split-second terror. He pulled his shirt up over his mouth and nose to cough, long and hard until his throat was moistened by blood. He clenched and popped his knuckles and felt the dry, overheated skin crack.

He stomped further down the stairs into the inferno, hearing the wood and concrete crack ominously around him. His eyes watered from the smoke, but he kept them as open as he could, scanning for any sight of his friend.

“BANDIT!” he yelled, keeping to the codenames even though no one was around to hear him. His voice was rough and deep, but with effort he was able to at least be loud. “BANDIT, CAN YOU HEAR ME?”

“HAZARD!”

The voice was distant, but not too much so – he could almost pinpoint where it was. “BANDIT!” he shouted in response, staring at the wall, not sure if he had to go further down or back up, caught between floors.

 _“_ _HAZARD!_ _”_ Down, definitely down. Kris cursed his luck and kicked down the door to the next floor down, clenching his eyes shut at the too-bright blaze and the overwhelming cloud of smoke that enveloped him.

“I’m here, Bandit!” he shouted after a coughing fit, throat wet but aching like he’d swallowed glass. More blood, then. Great. “Keep shouting, I need to find you!”

“Hazard, I’m trapped!” The lights were out and the smoke was obstructive, leaving whatever wasn’t clouded over to be illuminated by fire, thrown into stark shadow and bright orange. “Why didn’t we bring the walkies on this one?!”

Kris laughed despite himself. JC had a way of making him do that. “Man, I ain’t got a clue.”

Picking his way through and past smoldering cubicles and furniture, Kris finally discovered the problem – the ceiling had caved in near what seemed to be a maintenance entry for the floor. “Bandit, are you in there?”

“I’m under the rubble!” Some of it redistributed itself when JC moved underneath, grunting from the pain and effort. Kris started pulling stuff off and throwing it to the side, ignoring when his shirt fell from over his mouth and exposed him to the smoke, more focused on getting JC out. “I was coming through the door, but I opened it too hard and it hit the wall. It must have already been weak from the fire, ‘cause I barely got a foot in the door before it started to fall.” He grunted, and tried to move some more under the heap, but nothing moved much up top. “There’s a heavy beam over my legs, and my hands are burnt up from touching the door.”

“Sounds like you’re-” Kris coughed long and hard, blood on his tongue and lips now. It was the only reason he wasn’t choking on ash, though, so he ignored the searing pain. Talking almost let him forget the way his scars were blistering under his shirt. “-havin’ a great time, down here.”

JC laughed, dry and almost too quiet to hear over the roaring fire. “Where’s Wrecker?”

“Upstairs,” Kris said. “We were nearly at the roof when we realized you were taking too long. I told ‘em I’d come find you.”

“Noble.” JC coughed this time, but it wasn’t as hard as Kris’s fits were. He was low, probably low enough to be below the smoke. “Wait, Kri- Hazard, the fire! Are you-?”

Kris shook his head. He didn't want to think too much about it. “I’m fine. Let’s just get you out o’ here.”

It took Kris several minutes to dig him out, and his leg was visibly broken when Kris got him up, throwing one of JC’s arms up around his shoulders and putting a steadying hand on his waist. Otherwise JC was fine, breathing only a little too fast. He smiled at Kris and reached out with a blistered hand to pull the neck of Kris’s shirt back up over his mouth, then pulled his own up.

“Thanks, Haz,” he said, breathless, and Kris nodded.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here.” He was shaking and he knew JC could feel it.

The stairs were harder again, this time, now heaving the half-walking JC up with him. The flames had settled where they were, currently contented by steadily eating up everything instead of trying to spread up stairs, though they probably already had at this point. It felt twenty degrees hotter and Kris wanted to peel his skin off. His throat was unbearably dry. It took nearly half an hour to get back up to the top floor.

“D’you think they went up?” JC asked when Cam was nowhere to be seen, and Kris shrugged, dragging JC along. The building creaked again, and seemed to shift noticeably to one side. Kris’s heart leaped up into his throat while they took the stairs as fast as they could. JC was breathing through his teeth under his shirt, hissing in pain.

The fresh air of the rooftop wasn’t so fresh as much as it was diluted, but nevertheless it was welcome. Kris sucked in huge lungfuls that scraped his abused throat on the way down, and JC did the same. The urge to fall to his hands and knees and just breathe was almost unignorable, but then Cam was running at them and wrapping their arms around his and JC’s collective middles. JC winced.

“Oh my god, I thought you guys were dead, I was about to take my ‘chute and just-”

“We’re okay, Wrecker,” JC said, calmly. “Get in the chopper, we need to be gone, like, _yesterday._ _”_

While Kris helped JC into the driver’s seat, Cam locked themself into the back. There were sirens in the distance, but they seemed to be too far away to do any good. Too late to stop the fire.

“Are you gonna be able to drive in this state, Bandit?” Cam asked, nervous. JC shrugged, pushing Kris away and strapping himself in. He wiped the soot off his glasses.

“I’m gonna have to be, won’t I?” he said. “Unless one of you’ve miraculously learned how to fly a helicopter in the past couple hours?”

Kris climbed into the back and buckled up. “Let’s just go. If we gotta jump, we’ll jump when we get the hell out of here. I’m done with all this goddamn fire.” His hands were still shaking, harder than ever now that they weren’t busy.

JC nodded and, after a moment, they lifted off and away.

\--

Kris stumbled into his apartment late that night, thumbing out a goodnight text to JC (in bed with Court doctors for his broken leg) and trying to shrug off his impending exhaustion. Even without JC around, Cam had insisted that they go out and get a drink at Paloma’s bar, which had almost instantly become a favorite of theirs after Kris had introduced them. Before he’d left Cam at the bar, he’d asked Paloma to make sure the kid didn’t get any alcohol and break their three month dry spell, but he knew neither of them would be honest if they broke the promise, so he decided not to worry too much about it as he toed off his boots and flicked on the light.

His apartment hadn’t changed in his three years since joining the Court except to become more homely. He had pencil sketches he’d done up on the walls, actual rugs on the floor, and some dead flowers Cam and JC had gotten him for the year anniversary of his graduation from training in the middle of his dining room table. That was a month ago, though. He plugged his phone in at his bedside, and went over to toss the wilted blooms and dump the brown water down the kitchen sink, wrinkling his nose at the rotten smell.

He hadn’t been home in a couple days, getting ready to set that damn place ablaze, but home never felt like it after so much time away. He’d never- he guessed he never thought of his apartment as ‘home’ since he joined the Court, since Andrea had died, especially when he was there alone. More like home base, if anything. Somewhere to sleep, to keep his shit, to lie low until the Court had an assignment for him. Part of him almost regretted not taking up Park's offer to become a Contractor, if only for the extra time he didn't have to sit around at home with Andrea's ghost.

Christ, that was twice in one day, now, thinking of Andrea. Yeah, right after he’d- after he'd killed the kid, Kris had been distraught. He’d hated himself, and his Hazard identity, and the Court for putting him in that situation in the first place, but that was so long ago. He’d picked his gun back up the second Park had told him during combat training. He'd kept his codename, too. So maybe he wasn't as fucked up over it as he thought.

He rinsed out the rest of the dirt and leaves from the vase and set it down to dry, then stripped to his underwear. He’d already washed all the sweat from earlier away in the safehouse, and his blistering old scars were covered in a barely-damp layer of aloe vera. He prodded at his shoulder and winced, wondering if he should maybe get one of the plants for his apartment, then thought about the flowers he’d just thrown out. Probably not a great idea. He could pick up a bottle of the stuff somewhere, and he wouldn’t have to keep a window open for it.

His regrets were locked in the safe under his bed with a ski mask and a roll of hazard tape.


	19. "I don't know what you're talking about."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris sees a ghost.

_ONE (LAST) YEAR LATER_

_“_ _He has yellow scarf, and glasses,_ _”_ Roman spoke through Kris’s earpiece, Russian accent thick with boredom. Kris hummed in acknowledgement, sipping his iced coffee and watching the passerby. He was slouching in an uncomfortable metal chair outside a café that looked like it’d been copy-pasted from the streets of Paris, or Seattle. Inside it reeked of coffee and hipsters whose clothes smelled as old as they looked. It didn’t matter, though, ‘cause Kris had to be outside for the job. _“_ _Text me when you are finished. Roman out._ _”_

On his little table was a newspaper, old-fashioned but recent with the day’s date – el 6 de junio de 2020, or June 6th – under the title. Almost a year since the fire. Kris had tried to read it at first, but it was all in Spanish, so instead he just folded it up and set it down, leaving the flash drive he was dropping inside the folds.

Kris didn’t know what was on the drive, but he wasn’t supposed to. Whenever he wasn’t setting shit on fire or pulling other stunts with the Heist Squad, he’d found himself content in Intelligence with Roman. Mostly he did info drops like this one, passing off flash drives loaded up with god-knows-what to strangers in easily identifiable pieces of clothing. Roman considered him too striking to do any in-character work, and it didn't help that he had trouble hiding his accent. He and Roman had that in common.

It was almost officially summer, but the weather didn’t much care for the date and the sun beat down, making the air over a hundred degrees and dry as bone despite La Sierra's proximity to the coast. It was windy, but what should have been a pleasant breeze felt like a hair dryer on full blast, making the deep green umbrella over his table flap loudly.

The pickup guy was supposed to be there at any time this afternoon, and Kris could already feel his legs falling asleep. It was only 2, but he’d had to wait ‘til nearly midnight once for his charge to show up, long past when the coffee shop closed, the streetlights bleeding gold on the sidewalk. He’d started bringing his songwriting notebook along, just in case inspiration struck or he got too bored. Once Cam had tried to sit with him on one of these, but they'd gotten bored after half an hour of nothing and ended up sneaking into, then getting kicked out of, the bar across the street.

There was a rustle and Kris only looked up for a second to watch an unremarkable brown-haired guy with wire-framed glasses and a mustard yellow scarf (probably hell in this heat) scoop up the newspaper and continue on his way. Kris kept his head down, and took another sip of his coffee while he fished his phone out of his pocket.

TO: Roman  
FROM: Palmetto  
     _When should I get back?_  
SENT 6/6/20; 2:54 PM

Usually he’d loiter for another hour after pickup, to keep from being suspicious, and if it was early enough he’d head inside for another drink, or across the street for a beer. He quit his day job at Paloma's right after he joined the Court, though he still tried to make his shows. He was surprised she hadn’t already fired or banned him entirely after the bar fight, but the next time he’d showed up she’d just asked about his nephew (“Uh, he’s gone home.”) and poured him a tea.

The sidewalk was busy for mid-afternoon, but it was Saturday and there were teenagers crowding the corner, waiting for the light to change. They were all talking amongst themselves, too-loud and overexcited about whatever they were heading for. They seemed to be going downtown, maybe to the mall.

A tall figure passed by him, a stylish long coat brushing Kris’s shoulder when he passed. Dark brown hair in a ponytail pulled low at his neck, he was speaking into a phone. When Kris tried to eavesdrop he noticed he was speaking in another language. Kris thought it was Spanish at first, which was pretty normal, but no – it was too melodic and lilting, and Kris realized the stranger was speaking Italian. His thoughts jumped to Andrea immediately, and maybe- it had been three years, maybe he would have gotten taller, grown his hair out. But it was impossible, of course. Andrea was dead. Kris had pulled the trigger.

TO: Palmetto  
FROM: Roman  
     _Now._  
SENT 6/6/20; 3:16 PM

Kris was slinging his backpack over his shoulder, notebook away, when the stranger joined the crowd of kids on the corner. Kris was supposed to be going the other way, and he felt a little creepy for staring, but he wanted to at least get a glimpse of the guy’s face to settle his stomach. The light changed and let the crowd cross, and the guy turned so Kris could see his profile.

Kris’s heart stopped.

He couldn’t breathe, suddenly cold in the unbearable summer heat. His face went pale like he’d seen a ghost. It was fucking _impossible,_ it couldn’t be- But there, brow furrowed in concentration, speaking in harried Italian with a sparse, neat beard on his chin stood Andrea Olivieri, nineteen years old and, inexplicably, _alive_.

“Andrea!” He knocked over his table and the rest of his coffee with a loud noise, the thin bones of the umbrella cracking and shattering on impact with the ground. Andrea didn’t look up and crossed the street, walking quickly like he was late, or angry. _What the fuck._

“Dude, watch it!”

“Hey, get back here!”

Kris sprinted after Andrea, deaf to the other café-goers as he shoved through the kids in the crowd and grabbed Andrea’s shoulder, stopping him in the middle of the street. Andrea turned, glaring and ready to shout, but his face fell to shock and fear.

“Andrea, what the fuck?” Kris panted, breathless. The cars they’d stopped in front of honked, but he ignored them. “I thought you were-” The word ‘dead’ caught in his throat.

Fumbling to hang up his phone, Andrea shoved it in his coat pocket, hands shaking. “I- Kris-”

The car honked again, loud and drawn out and Andrea jumped like a startled animal, turning to look at it. He stared at the driver, then looked back at Kris, schooling his face blank. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Let me go.”

“Andrea, what are you-?” He cut off when Andrea tore his arm free and began to run.

 _“_ _Andrea!_ _”_ Kris tore off after him, zero to sprinting in an instant, putting his backpack on both shoulders so he wouldn’t drop it. Why the hell was the kid running? Why the hell was he _breathing!?_ He was dead, shot in the head and murdered with Kris’s own hands, with Kris’s own gun. His feet pounded hard against the concrete, against the pavement as he chased Andrea down, crossing streets and shoving people out of the way, cars screeching to a halt too-close but without impact. He kept shouting Andrea’s name, his _real_ name, like a reminder he couldn’t forget. No doubt he was going by something else now.

“Andrea, _stop!_ _”_ But he didn’t. Andrea was fast, faster than Kris had ever seen him, and he ducked and weaved through and past people and cars with every ounce of the grace Kris lacked, charging like a bull.

Christ, he could hardly believe- but that _had_ to be Andrea, his long nose and full mouth, more handsome than he’d been when he was younger, but with a deathly thinness of the face that Kris found unnerving. His cheeks were hollow in a way that Kris’s no longer were, since he’d joined the Court. And he’d said his name, breathless and reverent and horrified like one faced with death itself, and maybe that’s what Kris was to him. His death, personified.

How the fuck was he even _alive!?_

Andrea took turn after turn, block after block, running through crowds without disturbing the flow as if that way he could lose Kris. Kris was older, very nearly in his thirties, and his body had never been in better shape since his Court training. Park emself was built from what Kris suspected was time in the military, and maybe ey was, but given enough time in eir training program anyone could get that big. Kris was still lean, but had packed on a good bit of muscle about the chest and shoulders that he hadn’t had when he was running Hazard alone. Andrea had grown too, but more like he was stretched out longer, long legs like a gazelle and lanky as hell, but instead of looking clumsy and awkward he looked like one of those pointy models in the magazines, stylishly disheveled and wasting away.

He didn’t look dead _now,_ nimbly sliding over the hood of a parked car without setting off the alarm. Kris did the same, the alarm whooping to life behind him while he ran. He shoved past more and more bystanders, and people screamed. He was fairly sure he gained and lost a couple followers along the way, but he couldn’t hear them shouting over his own hard breathing. His legs were starting to ache, and the sun was starting to take a hold of him. Andrea didn’t seem to be tiring, glancing over his shoulder with a look of terror on his face. Kris wasn’t sure what kind of face he himself was making, but it felt like a glare.

 _What the hell was going on?_ How long had Andrea been awake, alive after what had happened with the heist? Was he still working with the Court? That thought arrested him – who else knew? Roman definitely must have, and maybe even JC, Cam, Park. How long had the Queen thought she would keep this secret? And why fake his death?

Would JC and Cam lie to him that long? Could they?

Maybe it was all a set up, an elaborate scheme to get the infamous Hazard to join the Court, to become yet another loyal fucking dog for the matriarch bitch herself. Her crazed, overzealous expression from when she’d offered him the choice to join her rushed to the front of his mind, and pure rage burned in his veins like liquid fire. He was gonna catch this damn kid, and he was gonna get some fucking answers.

Approaching one last intersection, Kris was sure he had him – there were sparse feet between them, and if he jumped he could have tackled him, but he wouldn’t do that in the street. Traffic didn’t stop, didn’t care, jumping and starting and blaring their horns while Andrea weaved his way across the road. The second his foot touched the sidewalk Kris would take him, otherwise he could get-

Another horn, too loud, then the impact. Kris fell to the asphalt, head cracking hard. The car that hit him drove straight over and away, obstructing his black-rimmed view as Andrea turned a corner and escaped. There was screaming – “Somebody call 911!” and “Oh my god, a hit and run in broad daylight, what the hell?” – and somebody hoisted him half off the ground by his armpits. They gently lowered him to the sidewalk just as he finally lost consciousness.


	20. "I'm not going anywhere."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris wakes up in the hospital.

“-ve to leave, sir.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Consciousness faded in and out slowly for Kris, apparently right in the middle of a (too loud,  _Christ_ ) argument. His head ached and his whole body throbbed, stiff and hurting. He tried to reach up and clutch at his forehead, but someone was holding his hand. When he tried to move it, the hand holding his squeezed comfortingly. Who the hell-?

“Mr. Stevens, visiting hours are _over_. Mr. Palmetto will be unconscious for at least another hour. You can come see him in the morning.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” the second voice insisted, stone cold. Familiar. Mr. Stevens? “If it was _your_ husband here, half fucking dead, would you just go home?”

The first voice scoffed, exasperated. “Mr. Stevens, I don’t- Wait, husband?”

“You heard me.” Kris didn’t remember being anyone’s husband. Somebody was covering for him, then. Weird cover, for the two of them, but he decided he’d just go with it. Didn’t have much choice in the matter anyway, in this state. “I’m gonna sleep right here, and I’m gonna wake up right here, and you’re gonna leave me be. I’m not gonna say so again.”

“I- I’m sorry, Mr. Stevens, I didn’t-”

“What, did you think we were brothers?” Sarcastic edge. Kris would have smiled if he didn't feel like his skull was split. “Get out, Doc. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“I-” The doctor huffed. “Fine. Good night, Mr. Stevens.”

She closed the door behind her and Kris expected his hand to be dropped, but it wasn’t.

“Kris, you awake?” the voice asked, softly. Kris groaned and managed a small nod.

“I fuckin’ hurt,” he rasped, throat dry as sand.

A soft laugh, and oh, shit, that was JC. Kris managed a half-grin at the sound. He thoughtlessly squeezed JC’s hand in his, rubbed his thumb over his knuckles. The “brothers” comment was funnier now; JC: tall, dark, and handsome, and Kris: not-as-tall, probably pale as the sheets, and covered in ugly scars. Not likely related.

“Well, you _did_ get run over by a car,” JC said, dryly, voice low and smooth, and Kris felt him sit down by his hip, warm and welcome. “Man, you weren’t even going the right way. Where were you _going?_ Do they teach you to look both ways where you come from?”

Memory flooded back with another throb of his head. _Andrea_. He managed to crack his eyes open. The lights were dim, the room illuminated by a rectangle in the door and the various machines Kris was plugged into. He and JC were alone, and JC looked very concerned about him, dark brows furrowed and eyes imploring, face thrown into shadow. His glasses reflected Kris’s heart-rate. Neither of them moved to let go of the other’s hand – Kris found the casual contact comforting.

Wait, he was getting sidetracked. Andrea. _Alive_. Part of him wanted to ask JC if he knew anything, but what if JC thought he was lying? Or worse, what if JC already _knew,_ and reported whatever Kris said to Park and Roman? What if Andrea already had done so?

“I’ll tell you later,” he mumbled, more to himself than JC. He had to tell _somebody,_ and he trusted JC. He had to. After a moment of silence, he felt compelled to explain a little. “I saw somebody I don’t think I was supposed to, so I- I chased them down. But they got away.”

JC nodded, accepting this for now. “Alright.” He looked at the door, but no one walked by. “Whenever you’re ready, Kris.”

Kris closed his eyes and breathed through his nose to ride through a particularly strong pulse of pain. Breathing too deeply hurt his ribs – they were probably fractured. He found himself smiling again, after a long silence to breathe.

“So, uh, how long have we been married, JC?”

JC laughed, startled. “Sorry, it was the best thing I could come up with. I didn’t have a lot of time to prepare. Roman called me the second I landed.” He looked down at their hands; Kris noticed they had matching wedding bands. “Is it weird? I’m sorry if it’s weird.” He made to let go of Kris’s hand, but Kris held fast.

Kris chuckled, wincing when his ribs protested. Yeah, definitely fractured. “It’s alright. I guess you’re good lookin’ enough to be my husband.” JC’s cheeks darkened and he looked away. Maybe _he_ thought it was weird, if Kris didn’t. Kris changed the subject. “How bad off am I? Like, injuries-wise.”

“You cracked your skull pretty bad-” Kris felt at the bandages wrapped around his head, prompting another throb. The skin was tender. He actually _had_ split hit skull. “-and you got a couple cracked ribs. I think your hip might be bruised, too. Actually, let me get this for you-” JC reached out for one of the machines hooked up to Kris, and pressed a button. A wave of numbness swept over Kris, and he lay his head back against the pillows heavily with a sigh.

“Thanks, bud,” he said. Suddenly, his eyelids felt heavy, droopy. Blackness was edging at his vision again. “I’ll see you in the morning?”

JC squeezed his hand one last time and let it go, standing up and heading for a chair by the door. He dragged it over to the bedside. He wouldn’t be gone before Kris could even black out properly, like Andrea had been. “Bet on it.”

“G’night, Jace.”

“Night, Kris.”


	21. "Dude, that's fucked up."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris tells JC something personal.

Kris woke up some hours later, light trying to fight its way through the heavy canvas curtains over the bed, throwing itself through the gaps to draw lines of light on Kris’s immobile form. JC was still awake, playing what sounded like some stupid game on his phone, but he tucked it away as soon as Kris started moving, pulling himself into a reclining position.

“Hey there, bud,” Kris rasped, eyes unfocused. He tried to sit up a little and winced. JC reached for the morphine, but Kris shook his head, holding out a hand. “No, I wanna be awake for a bit.”

“It’s pain meds, Kris. I don’t want you hurting.”

Kris laughed, and it hurt. JC sat back in his seat.

“You really do sound like my husband,” he said, good-naturedly.

JC looked away and shrugged. “I’m your friend. I gotta worry about you, if you’re not going to.” Nonetheless, he let his hand drop.

“I can take care o’ myself,” Kris mumbled, indignantly.

“By walking into traffic?”

Kris snorted. “You’re right. I’m an idiot.”

They lapsed into silence, but the longer they sat in silence the shorter time they’d have to talk before the doctor came back. JC spoke up. “So who were you chasing?”

Kris’s shoulders stiffened. “I told ya I’d tell ya later. You said you’d wait.”

“It’s later _now,_ Kris.” He sighed, a quick exhale out his nose. “It’s obviously important.”

“I’ll tell you later, Jace, alright!?” Kris’s eyes lit up with an anger he didn’t show JC often. His hands balled up at his sides, forearms tensing up on the hospital bed. “It _is_ important, but it can fuckin’ _wait._ _”_

“Until when?”

“Until I don’t hurt all over my goddamn body? Until I can go back to my own apartment instead of bein’ locked up here? Until I fuckin’ feel like it?” He huffed a frustrated breath out through his teeth. “God, I hate it here already. I ain’t been in a hospital since I was a kid,” he confided, maybe solemnly. “Not even when they set me on fire.”

JC made a noise almost like a gasp, choking on air. “Is that what the scars are from?” Kris nodded. “Someone _set you on fire?_ Dude, that’s fucked up.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Who was it?”

Kris shrugged. “Couple o’ guys I was working with a couple years ago, in Texas. Big cowboys.”

“Why the hell did they set you on fire?!”

He was quiet for a long time. He looked at JC’s face, calculating, then leaned his head back against the pillows to stare into the middle distance. His chest was tight and his throat closed up as if to make him stop before he began. “I was, uh. A little more experimental, back then. Acted more, uh, queer than I do now, and maybe this’s why I stopped, I dunno.” JC leaned forward in his seat, Kris could hear the scratch of the chair legs against linoleum. “I was, like, twenty-two. I was tryin’ on... I wasn’t nearly so _overtly masculine_ in private, an’ one of ‘em saw me, and he rounded up the others.” There was a brittle quality to his voice that he hated and his head was filled with the sounds of jeers, of his own screaming. Kris had never- he’d never told anyone about this before. He was reliving it now. He forced himself to go on. He’d already started, may as well finish. “They broke into my motel room, that night. Held me down on the bed, ripped off my shirt, doused me in gasoline, and set me on fire. Made quick work of it, jokin’ all the damn while. ‘Why you wearin’ a skirt if ya ain’t got no tits, faggot?’ Real funny guys.” He wasn’t all there anymore, eyes burning like gas in his retinas, blurring his vision. He clenched them shut. “I burned for what felt like hours, screaming and screaming, but no one came to help, and then they left.”

JC was silent. Kris didn’t open his eyes. “Jesus Christ, Kris, I’m so s-”

“I’ve never really told anyone before.” Kris unfurled a fist and turned it on its back, and JC took it in his own. Kris made himself look at him, trying to communicate appreciation but missing by a mile. He was pretty sure he grimaced. “Well, I kinda tol’ Andrea. Told ‘im I was set on fire. Not why, though.”

“And you never went to the hospital?” JC looked frantic, looked sick. Kris hoped it was sympathy.

Kris rolled a shoulder, looking back at JC and away again. “Yeah. I guess that’s why the scars’re so bad, huh?”

“What’s so bad?”

Kris and JC both snapped to attention when the door opened and a nurse walked in. “Nothin', ma'am,” Kris said, charmingly as he could muster.

She didn’t push. “So, ah, Mr. Palmetto. How are you feeling this morning?”

JC pressed his forehead against their clasped hands. Playing his part. Kris shrugged, made a noncommittal sound. He wondered how long JC had been up. “I’m fine. I've got a headache.”

“Have you had any morphine since you woke up?” JC breathed deep, warm. Inexplicably, Kris wanted to have him lay next to him, to match his breathing with his own. Maybe rest his head on his chest and hear his breath at the source, steady and smooth.

“No, ma’am,” he replied at length, flushing from his train of thought. What had gotten into him? JC dropped Kris’s hand and lay his head down on his arms atop the bed. Without a thought, Kris gently pulled his glasses off his face and set them down on the bedside table.

“Is that because you don’t hurt, or another reason?” Her sensible shoes padded lightly on the pale linoleum, stepping around JC to inspect the machines and the IV drip, which she changed out.

“I didn’t want to fall asleep again.”

The nurse hummed. “So you do hurt?”

“Everywhere, ma’am,” Kris admitted.

She was quiet. Nodded. “I’m going to give you a small dose. Believe it or not, you need to rest, Mr. Palmetto.”

“I was talking to JC.” He set a hand on the back of JC’s neck, gingerly, like he wasn’t sure he was supposed to. He squeezed, and JC shivered, shoving his face into his elbow. Warmth bloomed in Kris’s chest. He didn’t want to go to sleep. “I didn’t get the chance to when he showed up, last night. He was worried.”

“I’m sure he was,” she replied, sweetly, like she didn’t give a damn what his excuse was. There was a click as she pressed the button, and Kris’s whole body relaxed in an instant. “I’ll be back in an hour to check in on you two.”

“Alright, thank you, ma’am.”

“Sleep well, sir.”

Kris kept his hand on the back of JC’s neck, gently rubbing until they both fell asleep.


	22. "It's twenty-twenty, man."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> JC prepares to leave.

JC was busy.

He’d just landed from an extended Contract, one of the first since his leg healed, and he was going through post-flight checks. He’d only just turned his phone back on to check for anything pressing, but in the motion and monotony of these habits - inspecting the private jet he’d been hired to pilot for the last time - he didn't feel it vibrate in his pocket.

“You did a good job,” his employer’s pretty assistant said, grinning lopsidedly. He was tall and lanky and had flirted with JC at every chance he’d found, nervously brushing his ginger hair off his forehead. JC wondered if he was blushing, or if his cheeks are always that red. He hadn't found evidence to the contrary.

“Your boss paid me too much to fuck up,” JC said, half-distractedly and fiddling with something important. “Thanks, though.”

“I- What are you doing a-after this?” the assistant asked, and JC realized he couldn't remember his name. Or his employer’s name, though _that's_ probably emblazoned on the side of the plane.

JC shrugged. “I dunno, I-” He finally felt his phone vibrate again, and he cut off to check it. It was _Roman._ Surely he wasn’t so late Roman had to call him? He answered it with a curt, “Bandit speaking,” mouthing an apologetic ‘my boss’ to the assistant.

“Hazard is injured,” Roman said without preamble, and JC froze.

“What?” he asked, barely breathing.

“He was hit by a car,” Roman went on. He didn't sound all that worried. “Fractured his skull. A lot of bruising. He got taken to a civilian hospital before we could-”

“Who’s with him?” JC asked, cutting Roman off.

“No one, yet,” Roman said. “We’re prepping a sister or girlfriend-”

“I’ll do it,” JC said, and Roman huffed at being interrupted again. JC didn't really know why he wanted to- why he wanted to be there when Kris woke up, but- he couldn't even imagine what Kris looked like, hurt. He always seemed so strong, unbreakable and unwavering.

“They won’t let a friend stay with him,” Roman said, dismissive. “And you’re obviously not his brother.”

JC frowned. “It’s twenty-twenty, man. He’s my husband,” he said, mostly kidding, though he’s caught off guard by how much he liked the sound of that. The assistant visibly drooped. Oops. Two birds with one stone, JC supposed.

Usually, JC wouldn’t have been so opposed to getting to know the assistant a little better - not literally, of course. Post-Contract, pre-debrief was usually his prime time to, uh, get some. Not this time, however.

Roman huffed again. “Fine. Be there as soon as you’re finished.”

“Of course, sir,” JC said, and Roman hung up.

“So, uh...” the assistant started, redder than before. “Married?”

JC flushed. “Yeah,” he said. He was't- he wasn't a great actor, but it was a simple enough lie. He smiled a little bashfully.

“No ring, though,” the assistant said, gesturing with his clipboard at JC’s hands.

JC paused. “I, uh. Prefer to stay anonymous on jobs. Hide all my personal effects.” Not too bad. The assistant paused, then nodded.

“That makes sense,” he said. He left JC alone, and in half the time JC would usually take to do the checks, he’s done and speeding to the hospital.

\--

JC showed up outside Kris's hospital room right as two nurses were putting an unconscious Kris into his hospital gown. It was the most of Kris’s bare skin he’d ever seen - the scars he’d noticed on Kris’s upper arms and neck covered his whole chest and the top of his stomach, warped and shiny red. His abs were starkly defined and scratched up on his left side. Roman had told him over the phone that Kris had been seen running in the opposite direction of his pickup point, several blocks away, and had been hit by a car. Some reported he’d been chasing after someone in a long coat, but no other details had been reported.

Kris’s head was wrapped in gauze and still visibly bleeding, but other than that, a darkening bruise on his right hip, and various scratches and scrapes of varying depths on his face, Kris doesn’t look too bad.

“Sir, you can’t be in here,” one of the nurses said, but JC glared at him.

“My husband has been hit by a car, and you’re gonna make me leave?” he said, and the nurses paused.

“Are you checked in?” the other nurse said, and JC nodded. It had been the only way he could get in. Worse, he hadn’t had the patience or foresight to pick up a fake ID, so he’d had to use his real one. Jamal Stevens was legally in the building and JC felt more than a little exposed.

The nurses shared a look, and the second one shrugged. “Fine,” she said, and they both left, closing the door behind them.

JC dragged a chair from by the door to Kris’s bedside. He’d found, among an emergency disguise kit in the back of the Court SUV he’d brought with him, two gold rings and slid one on his finger and the other onto Kris’s. He didn't let go of Kris’s hand.

\--

The evening after he learned the truth about Kris’s scars, fully rested, JC finally left the hospital, but only for a bit. Kris was heading in for surgery on his fractured skull, and though JC wanted to play every bit the concerned, pacing spouse outside, Kris needed fresh clothes if they were going to be getting out of the hospital. He was hoping to get Kris out the day after next, sneaking out in the asscrack hours of the dawn. The rest of his recovery could be done in a Court infirmary. The Court didn’t like letting members sit in a hospital, especially members of the Heist Crew, who were potentially recognizable by civilians.

JC had been to Kris’s apartment a couple times, both times with Cam tagging along. Most of the time they’d played video games together, or maybe just hung over the back of the couch and watched Kris play something on his own, too drunk to hold a controller themselves. Now though, the apartment was still, and even though he had a key, he felt like an intruder. He flicked on the light and it started warming up, dim and yellow in the ceiling.

He looked around for a moment, taking in the tiny space. The vase Cam had nicked for JC to put the congratulatory flowers in was upside down on the counter like it was drying after being washed, like Kris had done so and forgotten about it. The bed was unmade and the bathroom fan was running. He flicked it off, then made his way to the wardrobe.

Most of the clothes were ordinary, worn-soft t-shirts that had no business actually being on hangers and jeans with holes in the knees and stringy hems that caught below the heel of Kris’s cowboy boots. On the far left was a heavy leather jacket that JC recognized as the one Kris used to wear when he was Hazard. He wondered where his tape was, if he still had it.

Shaking the head from his head, JC grabbed a dark green t-shirt and a pair of jeans at random, then pilfered through the two drawers in the bottom of the wardrobe for socks and underwear. The light was brighter now, and out of the corner of his eye he saw something poking out from under the bed. Setting down the clothes on the bed, he crouched down to tug it out and get a better look at what it was – a small, square safe with a combination lock. He didn’t want to break into it (though, naturally, he was curious), but he shook it around a little, holding it close to his ear, hoping whatever was inside wasn’t fragile. There was a heavy thud, and something soft like cloth. Huh. Interesting.

He set it back under the bed and scooped up the clothes, rolling them up and putting them into a small canvas bag he found at the bottom of the wardrobe. As an afterthought, he grabbed a gray beanie off the bedside table and put it in the bag, then flicked off the lights and left the apartment, locking the door behind him.

When JC got back to Kris’s hospital room, Kris was unconscious, head wrapped in clean bandages and alone for the night. JC hadn’t realized how late it was – nearly 9 o’clock. He just stood in the doorway, watching Kris breathe slowly in and out in the near-darkness, for a long while when he was interrupted.

“He’s gonna be out for a while.”

JC jumped, turned around. It was the same nurse from when he’d fallen sleep earlier, her afro held back by a headband. She was standing in the middle of the hall, holding a clipboard to her chest.

“Oh, I- Yeah, I guessed as much,” he said. He shifted his grip on the canvas bag. “So the surgery went well?”

“He’s gonna be just fine,” she said, and offered him a smile. “You should go home, Mr. Stevens. He’ll probably still be asleep when you get here in the morning.”

He shook his head. “No, I can’t leave him alone.” _I have orders._ “I’ll be fine.”

“I can’t imagine that chair is all that comfy,” and she was frowning, every bit the worried medical professional. “You need real sleep. In a bed.”

“I’ll be fine, miss.” He tried to repress the frustrated edge to his voice. If he could go home, he would have. Leaving the hospital at all would have gotten him in trouble with the Court if he hadn’t had a good reason. Turning his back on the nurse, he finally entered the room completely, closing the door behind him.


	23. "You want me to let you go?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris and JC finally get out of the goddamn hospital.

“Y’don’t think we could, uh...” Kris slurred, legs wobbling under him while JC helped him to his feet. “Do this... tomorrow?”

JC pulled Kris’s arm over his shoulder, and put his own arm around Kris’s waist. To Kris’s great chagrin, he shook his head. “No, they want you in Court custody as soon as possible,” he said. “You don’t need to be here.” He let Kris sit back against the hospital bed, and his head lolled to the side and back, carelessly. He’d been out of surgery for- for a day? A couple hours? Most of it he’d been unconscious, tired, woozy. JC started pulling the needles from his arms, gently as he could. He’d pushed the morphine button one last time before getting Kris on his feet, which also explained why he was a little, uh... wobbly.

“But I’m still hurtin’,” Kris complained. His eyes were out of focus, three JCs swimming in his vision. “And I’m tired. I wanna lay back down.”

“You can lay down when we get you outside to the car,” JC said, and checked his watch. “I promise.” He went over to a bag, Kris’s bag, and pulled out clean clothes which he then passed to Kris. “Get dressed.”

“Alright, babe.” Kris reached behind his neck to untie the hospital gown. He looked up after he got the neck untied, looking at JC with as much pointedness as he could manage. “D’you mind?”

“I- Yeah, sorry,” JC spluttered, turning around. Kris chuckled and untied the waist, leaving him naked. He nearly fell on his face trying to pull on his underpants, and his t-shirt got stuck around his head and nearly strangled him, and the jeans- where the fuck had JC even found these, holy shit, he hadn’t worn these in _years,_ at least a size too small as they were.

After a minute: “Okay, ‘m dressed.”

JC turned around while he pulled the gray beanie on over his bandages, and aside from the heavy bruise-colored bags under his eyes and the too-deep hollows of his cheeks, he was sure he looked almost normal. He shoved his feet into his socks and boots none too gently, wrinkling up the leather around the heel in patterns that were creased deep from repeated abuse.

“Ready to go?” JC asked once he found his voice. He was staring at the jeans and Kris snickered.

Still, he nodded, stretching his arms above his head. “Did you grab my tightest goddamn jeans on purpose? I ain’t worn these in a long time.” He turned around to look at his own ass, feeling JC’s eyes on him as he did so. He wanted to laugh.

“I, uh. No. Not on, um, not on purpose.” JC stammered. “Luck of the draw.”

Kris snorted, like he didn’t believe him, but thought it was funny. “Whatever, Jace. Let’s, uh...” He leant up off the hospital bed and swayed dangerously. JC put himself under his arm in the blink of an eye, putting a steadying arm around his waist. Kris blushed a little in embarrassment. “Let’s blow this joint.”

The actual escaping wasn’t as difficult as anticipated, hiding around corners from the nurses that would have recognized either of them and playing the part of a couple of tired visitors heading home, way too late, for the ones who wouldn’t. The hospital didn’t have experience in two infamous criminals trying to sneak out in the middle of the night, at least not often, and they didn’t have the proper measures in place to prevent it.

JC led the way, Kris almost too woozy and unstable on his feet to keep up on a last minute dose of morphine. He was clingy, clutching JC’s hand like a lifeline while they navigated the hospital, and when they got out, he beamed at JC, all teeth and half-lidded eyes, then embraced him, burying his face in JC’s shoulder. He took a deep breath of warm night air and JC, who smelled like hand sanitizer and sweat, warm and a little sweet.

“Kris, uh, what are you doing?” JC asked, voice rumbling through where their chests touched. Kris took another breath, nose poking at the junction of JC’s neck and shoulder. He breathed out his mouth hotly.

“I dunno,” Kris breathed, admitted, and he felt JC try to repress a shiver. “I’m tired. And I don’t hurt. And that was exciting.” He pressed his body closer to JC’s, nearly flush together. “Besides, you’re my husband, right?”

“I, uh. Not right now. We’re out. We, um, don’t really... don’t really need the cover anymore.”

Kris frowned, pulling back to look him in the face. “So you want me to let you go?”

“I, uh...” He was staring at Kris’s mouth. Self-conscious, he wet his lips, staring at JC as if to urge him to close that distance and-

“Get in losers!” A van pulled up on the side of the street, and Kris jumped, startled. Before he could think about it he was pushing off of JC, missing the warmth immediately despite the seventy degree night air. Cam wolf-whistled out the open passenger window, parking and climbing over the center console to sit in the passenger seat. Kris stumbled a little in his haste to climb into the back, and JC took a moment to breathe before going to the driver’s seat.

“You guys have fun at the hospital?” Cam asked through a wolfish grin.

JC shrugged, starting the car. He closed off and stayed silent.

“My head hurts,” Kris said. “I’m gonna take a nap, JC didn’t let me sleep.”

“‘Ayyyy,” Cam said, suggestively, but JC didn’t react. Kris laid himself longways across the backseat and promptly fell asleep.


	24. "You look green, bro."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cam makes a confession.

Kris slept for two days in a Court safehouse-turned-infirmary, a doctor with a coat lazily thrown over his civvies scoffing over him, changing his bandages and putting him back under every time he tried to get up. He didn’t see much in those glimpses, but most of the time he was alone with the doctor. He hadn’t thought he’d get used to JC at his side, but three full days of it was apparently enough. Their near-kiss in the break of dawn outside the hospital felt like years ago when he finally woke up for good.

“How’re ya doin’, Hazard?” the doctor asked, using his codename like his given name and weirding Kris out. He wasn’t used to it being said – shouted, screamed, hissed, spat, maybe, but never spoken casually.

“I’m, uh, fine,” he said, honestly. He didn’t hurt nearly as much as he had before, and he didn’t feel the numbing, floaty feeling of painkillers.

“Rate your pain?”

“Uh, three.”

The doctor nodded. He didn’t have a name badge. He looked down at a clipboard, then the laptop computer next to it. “I guess you’re free to go, if you’ve got a ride.”

Kris shook his head. “I’ll walk,” he said, making to get up, but the doctor shook his head.

“Son, you’re gonna get a ride. You’re not walking home in this heat, not while you’re still out of commission.” He put a big hand on Kris’s shoulder, forcing him down. “I’ll call for an escort.”

“I thought you said I was free to go?”

“It’s one-twenty out there right now. If you ain’t phonin’ a friend, you’re gettin’ an escort.” He was stern-faced and no-nonsense. Kris sighed.

“Where’s my phone?” he asked, and the doctor gestured to the bedside table. It was plugged in to an unfamiliar charger, and he grabbed it. “I’ll call a ride, no need for an escort.”

“Alright, son. You can wait in the foyer. Be safe.”

Kris nodded his thanks, and went out to the front room, already typing out a message to JC.

TO: Stevens

FROM: Palmetto

_Pick me up?_

SENT 6/12/20; 1:39 PM

TO: Palmetto

FROM: Stevens

_be right there. cam_ _’_ _s coming with._

SENT 6/12/20; 1:47 PM

Kris wondered why every Court vehicle had to look so suspicious, fake plates and black paint and tinted windows, while he climbed into the backseat, some twenty minutes later. It was a little much. It was a wonder the police hadn’t caught on.

“How ya feelin’, Kris?” Cam asked, feet on the dash and seat leaned far back.

“Better,” he replied. JC didn’t look back at him, even in the rear view mirror. He cursed himself – he’d thought that maybe there was... _something_ going on between them, back at the hospital, but he must have read it all wrong. All that hand-holding, and playing married, and- oh, _god,_ he told JC about his burns. His stomach twisted up tight, tense. Kris had definitely been too comfortable with him. JC was probably weirded out now, especially after Kris had draped himself all over him and maybe, almost kissed him. _Fuck_.

“You sure?” Cam twisted around to look him in the face. “You look green, bro. I thought you were injured, not sick.”

Kris waved them off. “I’m fine, I just wanna go home. I’ve got somethin’ important ta ask y’all.”

“What about?” Kris wasn’t buckled in, and was bent over, elbows on his knees and hands dangling between them. Cam reached back and touched his hands, barely able to reach him with their short arms.

“I’ll tell y’all when we get there.”

“Is this about who you were chasing?” JC asked, curiosity overriding his stalwart silence, apparently. Kris nodded.

“Yeah, it is.”

“You were chasing somebody? When?”

“That’s how he got run over,” JC explained. “He said he saw somebody he wasn’t supposed to, and while he was chasing them down, he got hit.”

“Dude, you didn’t look both ways?”

“That’s what I said.”

Kris rolled his eyes. “I was preoccupied.”

“See where that got you,” JC mumbled, and Kris couldn’t help a snort.

“And what do you mean, someone you weren’t supposed to see?” Cam ignored the joke, getting serious. “How would you know?”

Kris snorted again. “Trust me, I know.” If he was supposed to know Andrea was alive, he would have known. He knew, now, in the pit of his gut that the Court was behind all this. It made him sick. He still had a feeling like he’d seen a ghost, like it had all been a dream, but he had felt Andrea shaking in his grip, felt the burn of his muscles under the too-hot California sun while he chased him down, felt the metal crashing into his hip and throwing him over, felt the gravel embedding itself in his cracking skull. Hell, if he reached up under his hat he could have felt the staples holding him together.

He had the knowledge, but beyond all else, he just wanted to know why. Why keep this from him? Why let him stew in the guilt and- and self-hatred for so long, potentially his entire life?

Something was wrong, and Kris intended to find out what it was.

Being back in his apartment was an immediate relief, but when both JC and Cam rounded on him expectantly, he tensed right back up. The lights flickered on, dim at first but steadily brightening, very little sunlight filtering through the closed blinds by the TV and behind his bed. He locked the door behind him, steeling his expression. He took a deep breath and turned on them.

“I saw Andrea.”

Neither one of them said anything, eyes going wide. Cam looked more afraid than shocked.

“Kris, what the fuck?” JC furrowed his brow. “Did the head injury fuck you up that bad?” He reached out, as if to take a closer look at Kris’s head and see the faulty memory through his skull. Kris ducked out of the way, frowning.

“How do you know it wasn’t, like, a doppelganger?” Cam asked. “It’s been three years. He wouldn’t look the same anyway.”

Kris shook his head. “No, I’m sure it was him. He walked past me after I did an info drop for Roman, talking on the phone in Italian. He’s taller, and skinnier, and his hair is long, but it was definitely him.” He clenched his fists at his sides when Cam gave him a pitying look. “I called his name and grabbed his arm, and he called me ‘Kris-’”

“He knew your name? He knew your _face?_ _”_ Cam was stunned.

Kris nodded. JC had kept his promise not to tell them, but he guessed it was okay, now. “I- I stumbled home badly injured, one time. I was drowning in blood and couldn’t breathe. I let him take off my tape, and I told him my name. They come together.” He shrugged. “Came together, I guess. I don’t really tape up anymore.” He shook his head, furrowing his brow. “But that’s not the point! It was definitely him. He looked me in the face, got all serious, then said ‘I do not know what you’re talking about,’ then ran off.”

“That couldn’t have been Andrea,” Cam hissed through their teeth. “You killed him. He’s fucking _dead!_ _”_

“But he’s obviously not!” Kris shouted. He took a step forward, and JC stepped back, but Cam didn’t. “I saw him! I nearly fucking died trying to catch him! You think I’d do that for a stranger?!”

“I don’t know who you were chasing,” they said. “But Andrea is dead. You were chasing a ghost, probably conjured by your fucked up conscience.”

Most of the time, Kris and Cam could get along just fine, but the instant Andrea was brought up Cam was at Kris’s throat, clawing out every ounce of guilt to brandish in his face. It was a precarious friendship. Moments like these were more and more common, these days. Cam really never would forgive Kris his accident, would they?

JC turned his stunned look on Cam. “Dude, what the fuck? What if he’s right? It could happen, if Andrea got the right medical attention and was super fucking lucky. He could have survived. The Court-”

“No, he couldn’t!” Cam was hysterical, nearly screaming. “I _know_ he’s dead. I saw his body! Did you see him, Jace? See the holes in his head, see his face pale and blood stained? He was dead before he hit the ground.”

“I- No,” JC admitted, frowning.

Kris felt that crushing guilt on his shoulders for a moment once more, visualizing the scene, but shrugged it off. He could see Andrea’s eyes, terrified but so very alive, whenever he closed his own. “Cam, why are you so damn insistent that he isn’t alive?” he growled, getting closer. They didn’t step back, but when they looked up at his face, they looked like they wanted to. “Why are you trying so hard to convince me?”

“I- I don’t-” they stuttered, and Kris grabbed them around the throat, lifting them up on their toes.

“What are you trying to do?” He leaned in, growling into their ear. “If you know what’s going on, you’d better fucking tell me.” He turned to push them against the wall, and up off their feet. Their small hands clawed at his forearm, but found no leverage, gasping for air.

“Kris, let them go!” JC shouted, coming at him but not touching, keeping a safe distance. Of course he was scared of Kris- _no,_ he was scared of Hazard. Kris supposed that was the point, and ignored him. “They don’t know anything, let them go!”

“I don’t believe that, Cam,” Kris said, deathly calm. “And you’re gonna tell me right now what you know, if you know anything, or I’ll bash your head open on the wall.”

“Kris, no!” JC came closer, maybe to try and stop him, but even from behind he couldn’t. Kris managed to elbow him, hard, right in the chest and he crumpled, gasping. “Kris, let them go, they’re your friend, you can’t-”

“I knew!” Cam hissed, finally. “L-let me-” They sucked in a huge breath, doubling over to put their hands on their knees. They panted for a long time, and both Kris and JC stared.

“What?” JC asked, shocked.

“Repeat that,” Kris said, lowly. _"Now."_

“I knew! I knew Andrea was alive!” Cam said, voice rasping and barely-there. They paused for breaths between almost every word. “I- It was all part of Park’s plan. The heist- the Queen wanted Hazard. She wanted you. So she and the High Court – Perez, Park, Roman, and Lewinsky – all came up with the plan. I- I was the only person on the Heist Squad who knew, besides Andrea.”

Kris couldn’t breathe. He staggered back from Cam, eyes wide, until his knees his the arm of the couch, and he sat down. JC was still on the floor, staring up at the both of them in horror.

“Cam, what are you talking about?” JC asked, picking himself up slowly.

Cam did the same, straightening out as their breathing normalized. “I’m so sorry, Kris, I’m so-”

“Tell me the plan,” Kris said. He wasn’t even looking at them anymore, staring at his hands in his lap. “Tell me everything, right now, before I kill you for lying to me for  _three fucking years._ _”_

They nodded, eyes welling up. “I- the Queen always- she hated you, or she admired you, or something. She never interfered with your games, but she- I guess she watched them. Followed them, and you. I mean, this is all speculation, ‘cause no one knows what the Queen thinks except for the High Court, sometimes, but I mean- Anyway, she wanted you. Maybe she wanted you dead, maybe she wanted you like you are now – a part of her Court, another soldier. Maybe she was threatened by you. Like you said when we first met, you hated the Court. And you were unpredictable. So she needed the threat, uh. Neutralized.

“So she gave you Andrea. He’s- You know he’s an actor. He’s young, and he’s sweet, and he’s pretty, so she thought you would get, um, attached. Not, like, sexually! Or romantically! Well, that would have worked, actually, and she was open to that, but whatever way, she needed you attached. And then we’d pull the heist, and Andrea would die, and you would be blamed, and then you wouldn't fight when she made you pay for your sins.”

Kris was repulsed. Andrea had spoken of being treated like an object, but being bought and sold was almost nothing to this. He was a bargaining chip in the Queen’s game and it chilled Kris to the bone.

“That’s fucked up,” JC whispered, and put a hand on Kris’ shoulder, as a comfort. It did its job, and Kris resisted the urge to lean into him. “Cam, why did you keep this from Kris? From the both of us? Andrea was our friend, and you let us think he was dead all this time.” God, his voice was so gentle, so kind. Cam didn’t deserve it.

Cam’s shoulders shook while they shrugged, and their breathing had become uneven once more. “I didn’t- I didn’t think it would matter. I was following orders.” They swallowed thickly. “I’ve been in the Court since I was a kid. The Queen- she was a younger kid than I was, and I watched her kill her brothers up on that stage in the old warehouse. She had Perez slit their throats, and she smiled.” They were definitely crying now, hands shaking and wiping at their cheeks. “I- I love the Court. The Court is my family, and the Queen is my- is our benefactor. And I am terrified of her. There was nothing I could do.”

“How did Andrea agree to this?” Kris asked, ignoring the emotional outburst. He was still trying to puzzle his way through the details. “I can’t believe he was confident in his chances.”

“The Court has amazing doctors, Kris,” JC supplied. “I’d trust my chances, but a bullet through the head- I dunno.”

“Andrea didn’t have a choice,” Cam said, trying to steady out. “He’s- He’s Court property. The Queen bought him from his previous benefactor. He’s only a member of the Court in name –in practice, he’s just another tool.”

“But he’s a human being, not a toy!”

“I- Kris, I know,” Cam said. “But the Queen- She’s fucked up. Too much power, too damn smart. She does what she wants. We’re all her pawns, her tools. He’s just... more so.”

“That’s fucked up,” JC repeated, and Kris nodded.

“So I made her job easier, when I shot him?” he asked. “Kid was gonna die anyway, but I made myself the bad guy?”

Cam shook their head. “I was waiting for you to aim your gun at him. Then I’d try to startle you, and- that gun was Court issue. It was rigged. I had a- a remote in my pocket.” Their voice got thick. “So, I guess I pulled the trigger. But I knew he would- I knew he’d survive. Or at least, I trusted the Queen wouldn’t let her most prized possession die. So it’s different. Not better, but... different.”

He didn’t even get the chance to pull the trigger. The guilt on his shoulders felt like it lifted, but a furious hopelessness twice its size took its place. Was there anything, anything at all, that he could have done to prevent this from happening?

“Thank you for bein’ honest, Cam,” he finally said, voice empty. “This is the Queen’s fault. We’re all pawns in her game.” What was it with the Queen and giving him head injuries?

“I’m sorry I never told you,” they said, and the honest regret in their voice was heartbreaking. JC put a hand on Cam’s shoulder, too, standing between them and Kris like an anchor.

“So, what’s the plan, then?” JC asked, and Cam looked at him like he was insane.

“What plan? To do what?”

“To get revenge, and maybe save Andrea,” JC said, like it was obvious. Kris and Cam shared a look. Cam looked like that was the worst idea they’d ever heard.

“That’s the best damn idea I’ve ever heard,” Kris said, finally letting himself smile, toothy and wicked. The kind of smile he usually hid behind tape.

“No! It’s not!” Cam said, shrugging off JC’s hand. “Guys, you don’t get _revenge_ on the Court! You can’t! If we try, we’ll all be killed!”

“So what do you propose, Cam?” Kris asked. “Since you know so much about the inner workings of the Court.”

They flushed in frustration. “I _propose_ that we keep our mouths shut! Andrea’s alive, and he’s working for Intelligence like he always wanted to, and he’s _fine_. You’re damn lucky he didn’t tell Roman that you saw him! They’re gonna kill me for telling you anything at all, let alone all I already have!”

“You’re our friend, don’t you think you owed us that information?”

“I love you guys, but I don’t owe you _shit!_ Let alone my life!” They snarled, baring their teeth with all the bravado they hadn’t had when Kris was holding them a foot off the floor with one hand. “I’m gonna fucking die because of this. Andrea’s blood may be on my hands, but mine will be on _yours._ _”_

“It’s on the Queen’s hands, all of it!” JC interrupted. “She’s manipulating you, Cam! Of course she is! And all of us, and Andrea, and everyone else in the Court. None of this is gonna stop-”

“-unless we kill her,” Kris chimed in with him, speaking the death sentence in unison, looking at JC with stars in his eyes. He’d been thinking it but hadn’t thought anyone would agree.

Cam’s face twisted in horror. “What?” they hissed, staggering back as if struck. “We can’t- we can’t kill the Queen!”

“And why not?” JC asked.

“Because she’s the Queen!” Cam yelled. “She’s- she’s practically untouchable! We don’t even know where she is. La Sierra is huge, the Court is huge, there’s no way we’ll ever find her, and then what? Just fight through waves of guards like a video game? And that’s saying nothing of Perez!”

“Cam, we’re the Heist Squad!” JC exclaimed. “We’re as good as it gets! The Contractors, the Cavalry and the Infantry and the Streets and the Windows all _dream_ of being us.”

“But the Queen created us.” Cam was somber, all of a sudden. “I don’t want to die. I don’t want you two to die. Hell, if the Queen finds out what we’re doing, she’ll probably kill Andrea, too.” They swallowed. “Andrea is loyal to the Queen. She’s the only reason he’s still alive right now. How do we know he hasn’t already gone to Roman?”

“Because he wouldn’t do that,” Kris said, certain. “He isn’t loyal to the Queen.” Andrea shouting, _“_ _She bought me from him! Like property, again!_ _”_ right here, in this same spot in his apartment, echoed in his mind. Like Cam said, Andrea was an actor. And since Kris had hardened him, he was bulletproof. He could fool even the Queen, Kris was sure.

“You think he’s playing her?” JC asked, and Kris shrugged, making a noise like ‘maybe’. “Cheeky little shit. I knew I liked him.” He grinned.

“If we could find him and talk to him, he could help us kill the Queen,” Kris said.

“Are you still going on about that? We can’t kill the Queen!”

“Not with _that_ attitude, Cam,” Kris said, in a brighter mood now with the image in his mind of the Queen’s head rolling, quite literally. JC laughed.

“Kris is right, and I’m sure as hell done being used,” he said. “So are you gonna help us, or are you gonna let us go it alone?”

Cam bit their lip, then sighed, eyebrows drawn up in concern. “Are you guys really serious?”

Kris nodded, serious as the grave, and JC did the same. Cam whined, then nodded as well. “Fine, fine. I’ll help you guys, because this is my fault, and we’re probably gonna die anyway, and I’m pretty sure you’ll kill me if I don’t.”

“Smart kid,” Kris said, and ruffled Cam’s shitty haircut. He went over to his bed and pulled the safe out from underneath. “So, kids, what’s the plan?”

Cam hopped up on the kitchen table, sitting Indian style up on the wood, lookin’ more scared than Kris had ever seen them. JC pulled out a chair and flipped it around to sit in it backwards, facing Kris.

“I guess we should find Andrea first,” Cam said, reluctant to get involved. JC nodded his agreement.

“Yeah, so we should probably go to Roman. Interrogate him.”

“Y’all know where he is?” Kris asked. In all his time in the Court, training directly under Roman, he never learned much about the man. Russian ex-patriot, inappropriate with subordinates, close to Park. Handsome but older, and every bit the creepy, over-sexual older guy, but a genius in every aspect. Roman wasn’t someone one trifled with lightly. He was the head of Intelligence for the Court for a reason. Kris had worked close with him fairly often over the last three years.

JC nodded. “I know where he works most days.”

“And how do you propose you get him to talk to us?” Cam asked. “You gonna strangle him up on the wall? He’s as built as you are, Kris.”

Kris shrugged. “There’s three of us, and he won't see us coming. We can figure something out.” He finally opened up the safe, and pulled out the roll of tape to roll it around in his hands. He hadn’t touched it in over a year now, but it was so familiar in his hands it made him feel a little less hopeless. “I wanna wear my tape when I kill the Queen.”

“Who says _you_ _’_ _re_ killing the Queen?” JC asked, mostly joking. “What if I get there first? Or Cam?”

“I’m doing it. She did all this shit to fuck _me_ over. I deserve her blood.”

“And if Andrea is there? He died for this.” Cam wasn’t fucking around.

Kris shook his head. Neither was he. “She’s my kill. No question.”

JC shrugged. “Whatever floats your boat, Kris.” He leaned back in his chair, hanging on to the back of it with his hands. “So we’re gonna track down Roman and beat him ‘til he talks?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Kris said, and Cam winced, but didn’t say anything. Kris ignored them.


	25. "His head is made of stone."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris confronts Roman.

“Roman, I need your help.”

The Russian peered up from his work, over the top of his glasses. He raised an eyebrow, sitting back in his seat.

“Andrea!” he said, surprised at his company. He wasn’t pleased. “Shouldn’t you be at El Palacio?”

Andrea shook his head, too-fast and anxious. “No, I need your help. I- Hazard saw me.”

Roman burst up, and his chair slammed against the wall behind him. “Are you sure?” His voice was low, eyes boring into Andrea’s with a fire that reminded Andrea of Kris. Andrea nodded, memories of scathing blue eyes and a strong grip on his upper arm filling him with dread. _Oh, god_. When Kris found him- “When did it happen?”

“A week ago,” he said. “I wasn’t going to say anything, I didn’t know what to do-”

Roman nodded, coming around his desk to put an arm around Andrea’s shoulders. Andrea resisted the urge to shrug him off, uncomfortable with the proximity. “You’ve done the right thing, coming to me,” Roman said, but already Andrea wasn’t so sure. “Hazard is close with Wrecker, and Wrecker- doesn’t she know the whole of the plan?”

“Yes, _they_ do,” he answered, and Roman continued to nod, thoughtfully.

“Then Hazard is probably tracking you down as we speak. He probably forced the truth from her.” Andrea’s blood turned to ice, but Roman continued to speak. “He will come to me, and he will demand to know where you are on pain of death.”

Andrea wanted to argue that Kris wasn’t like that, but he knew he was wrong. “Do I- Do I have to keep hidden? If he is coming, couldn’t I just reveal myself?”

Roman shook his head. “Not unless you plan to kill him before he kills you,” he said. “Since you have been... out of commission, Hazard has become more and more dangerous, more and more violent. His hatred of the Court has increased tenfold, and his hatred of you. He blames you.”

Andrea frowned. “But if Wrecker told him what really happened-”

“He will not care. His head is made of stone. He will come after you, and if you allow him to find you, he will kill you.” Roman looked him in the eye. “Do you want to die, Andrea?”

That didn’t make any sense. Kris- Kris hadn’t looked like he wanted to kill Andrea a week ago. After a pause, Andrea shook his head. “No, sir.” He paused once more. “What will you tell him, if he asks?”

“I must speak with the Queen immediately,” Roman said. “Your state of living has been compromised. You are in great danger. You are very lucky Hazard got hospitalized when he did.”

Seeing Kris’s body, crumpled in the street and bleeding from the skull hadn’t made him _feel_ lucky, but Andrea accepted the blessing where it came. His heart was pumping in his throat. “What are we going to do?”

There was a loud banging on the door and Andrea jumped. “Roman! Open up!” That was Kris’s voice, and Andrea’s heart stopped. He had come too late.

“One moment!” Roman shouted with believable casuality, and ushered Andrea toward the coat closet in the corner. Andrea’s eyes went wide, and he shook his head, but Roman locked him inside. Andrea knew better than to struggle, and instead stayed as silent as he could, hidden away. He sunk to his knees and shut his eyes to listen. It reeked like Roman’s cologne and dust and Andrea’s claustrophobia wrapped a clawed hand around his throat.

The door to the office opened, and three pairs of footsteps stomped in. The door slammed shut, and two of the pairs stopped. Guarding it, perhaps.

“Ah, Hazard, Wrecker, Bandit,” Roman said, a little out of breath but otherwise perfectly fine. “I didn’t, ah, expect this visit.”

“We thought we’d surprise you,” JC said, and Andrea winced to hear his voice. He hadn’t known about the false death either, had he? He probably hated him as much as Kris did.

“Yeah, that’s what it is,” Kris said, wryly. “How ya been, Roman? I ain’t seen you in a while.”

“You were in the hospital,” Roman said. “I couldn’t very well have you do an info drop in bandages. Why are you wearing the tape?”

Kris chuckled quietly, and Andrea had to press his ear to the door to hear it. “I guess you’re right.” He ignored Roman’s second question. Kris hadn’t worn the tape once since he joined the Court – Andrea had seen it in his file.

There was an extended silence that Roman eventually broke. “What is your purpose?” he asked. “Why are you here?”

There was a pause, a rustle of cloth, and the cocking of a gun. “I’ve got a couple questions for ya,” Kris drawled, and now Andrea knew it was there he could hear the slight muffling effect of the Hazard tape over his mouth. “If you’ll oblige me.”

A sharp intake of breath. A harried, “Of course.” Andrea had never seen Roman look afraid, but he could imagine it well enough, coiffed blonde hair askew and eyes wide, mouth slightly open.

Quick footsteps, one pair steady and the other awkward as if going backwards. A thunk as Roman was pushed up against a wall, not far from the closet. If Andrea could open the doors, he could have seen them, been seen by them. Roman’s breathing got ragged and fast.

“Andrea’s alive,” Kris hissed. “I’ve seen him.”

Roman spluttered. “I- I don’t know what you’re-” He choked off, literally, gasping uselessly for air.

“I know you know where he is,” Kris growled, and Roman keened, a high-pitched, desperate sound. Andrea heard a high gasp from by the door and assumed it was Cam. There was repeated thumping and scuffling as Roman’s feet struggled for purchase. Andrea sat down, scared his shaking would disturb the guests if it was too noisy. He balled his hands in his lap. “And you’re gonna tell me where he is, or I’m gonna blow your head open. D’you think the Court doctors can pull two miracles in a row?”

“H-Hazard, please-”

_“Roman.”_

Roman choked, gasped for a long moment, and Andrea thought maybe he couldn’t speak at all anymore, but then he finally gasped out, “-scondite!”

There was a heavy thud as Roman was finally allowed to fall to his feet, gasping all the while, wheezing and coughing.

“Keep talking, Roman,” Kris said, and Roman abruptly quieted down, holding his tongue.

“He is... he is at the hideout,” Roman said, at length. “El Escondite. I don’t- It is outside the city, to the east, inland.”

Andrea had never heard of El Escondite, nor any safe house in that direction aside from the one where the Heist Crew hid out after heists, and it definitely wasn’t called ‘El Escondite.’ What was Roman doing? There were dozens of safe houses in the city, and a couple to the north and south, along the coast, but inland? What purpose could it possibly serve?

“Who is with him?” That was Cam. They had visited him occasionally after... after the heist. During his two years of re-training and therapy (of the physical sort and not), he didn’t see much of anyone, but the Queen allowed Cam to come visit him occasionally. It lessened the bone-crushing guilt of leaving Kris and JC thinking he was dead, but only by a miniscule amount.

“I don’t know,” Roman said. “Guards, perhaps. At the most ten of them. El Escondite is- it is hidden, yes? No one knows of it. Please take the gun away, please.” He was whispering at the end, pleading.

Kris grunted. “Should I kill ‘im?” he asked Cam and JC, or maybe it was a rhetorical question. The way he waited for a response showed the former to be true.

“Do it,” Cam said after the silence, though they didn't sound happy about it. “He knows what we’re up to. He’s gonna tell the Queen, or at least Park.”

“JC?”

Andrea imagined him shrugging. “Might as well. I guess we’re tearing the whole Court apart for this kid.”

 _Kid_. Only Kris had ever called him that. Were these three that close now? Andrea had spent a year asleep and another two trying to put himself together, while all his friends got closer without him. And now they wanted to kill him. Brilliant.

Kris snorted, and pulled the trigger. Roman didn’t have a chance to protest. Something like pleasure flourished in Andrea’s chest when he heard the final, anticlimactic thud as Roman’s body hit the floor. He’d never liked Roman much, though he didn’t realize he hated him so much as to be happy at his death. Andrea bit his lip.

“Heh, y’all’re right.” Kris sniffed, and the door opened. The schoolhouse was suspiciously silent. “I just hope the kid’s okay.”

“We all do,” Cam said, and the door slammed behind them.

By the time Andrea processed that, he also processed the fact that he was trapped in a closet, and the only person who could unlock it was dead, feet away from the doors. Swallowing his fear around his heart in his throat, Andrea lay back, lifted his legs, and started kicking the door down.

It took Andrea thirty minutes to break the lock, shattering the wood around it slowly with kick after kick after kick until his legs were sore. Even so, they didn’t hurt as much as they had after he'd run from Kris. That had been the scariest situation of his life - he'd known that Kris hadn't really pulled the trigger, but a part of him still saw Kris as the man who'd killed him, and running from _that_ had overtaken every other impulse, every rational thought. There was a fury in the older man's voice when he'd shouted Andrea's name over and over that terrified him at the basest level.

Roman had said that Kris hated him, hated him for working with the Court and hated him more for playing dead for nearly three years, but what had Kris just said? _“I just hope the kid’s okay.”_

Had Roman lied? Andrea hoped so, but it was scary to see how far Kris was willing to go to “save” him. Yeah Andrea was isolated and, _god,_ he missed his friends, but working in Intelligence was much more fun to him than working with the Heist Squad. Working as closely as he did with the High Court, he'd never felt safer in his life.

(Andrea ignored a memory of strong arms around him, of blood on his tongue and fear in his veins and _“You did great, kid,”_ so quiet he almost didn't catch the sound.)

He was alone in Roman's office but for a bleeding corpse and he stepped around it, shoving the urge to retch back down his throat. It was just the smell of blood, _get a hold of yourself, Andrea._ He had to- He had to follow the Heist Squad, go to El Escondite. Talk to them.

He found a pair of keys in Roman's pants pocket, and with them he unlocked the drawers of his desk. There was another key ring, this one for a car, in the first one he checked, and Andrea pocketed them without pause. Further inspection revealed nothing else of interest. The computer was shut down and locked up, probably behind more passwords than Andrea could even dream, so he didn't even try it.

Before he left to follow Kris and the others (though how he intended to follow them when they had more than a half hour lead was beyond him) he took a final look at Roman's body. The sight of that corpse vindicated him, and the initial disgust he’d felt fell away to pure satisfaction. The High Court – all of them he was sure – had been in on the heist, and on his- on his _purchase_. It wasn't hard to imagine Roman arranging the deal with his Spanish benefactor, Perez and Park overseeing the negotiation with steely glares and weapons ready, Lewinsky funneling two million dollars into various secret accounts while the Queen looked on, grinning, all smug and entitled. White hot fury flared up inside of him and angry tears pricked at his eyes before he forced himself to calm. Kris- Kris had just killed Roman for him. Who else would he kill to “save” him?

If he could- if he could put _the entire High Court_ into Kris's line of fire-

Andrea shook his head. No, that would make him no better than the Queen, using Andrea as a tool, Kris as a game, everyone else as pawns. But _god,_ it would feel good to know that they were all dead. It would feel good to know he had killed them, if indirectly. He smiled down at Roman's body with a wicked pride he'd never before indulged in.

He shoved his conscience down and locked it away the way he did his real self when he acted. He took a moment to fall into character, to quicken his breathing and half-sob, tears forming in his eyes, before he ran from the office toward Park's across the way to give em the news.

“Park!”

One down, four to go.


	26. "You're just noticing that now?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Heist Crew arrive at El Escondite.

El Escondite was hard to find, a sand colored building standing tall and proud, surrounded by brush and dirt and rocks, looking like a spectacular version of the safe house they’d hidden in after the heist three years ago.

Kris was restless on the drive, on his ass then on his back, feet on the floor then on the seat then over the back of the whole damn thing, head dangling, upside down. Cam was similarly nervous, foot twitching incessantly and fingers twitching over their phone's screen (though Kris couldn't see what they were doing on it), and JC tapped anxious, tuneless rhythms on the steering wheel. The city passed by outside, dimmed by the dark tinted glass but still there, and when they got out into the desert out east the sunlight washed everything out to gray.

It was an hour of driving, the interior of the car as silent as the exterior, when they finally found their destination. They hadn’t thought to get an address from Roman, but an address was meaningless out here. “You can put numbers on a building but that doesn’t mean it exists,” Kris had said when Cam complained.

There was no yard and no porch, and El Escondite stuck straight up, like something alien that didn't belong there, or like it had grown naturally from the ground. The windows were dark, though whether they were covered from the inside or tinted like the car's, Kris couldn't tell.

“Is this it?” Cam asked, tucking their phone away, and JC shrugged.

“It’d better be,” Kris said. “I was ‘boutta get carsick.”

JC parked out front, and their shiny, pitch black SUV stuck out like a sore thumb, but there was nothing to do about it. They hadn’t seen the building from a distance – it blended in with the hills – so there was no hiding the car and sneaking up on it. It didn't seem to matter, though. There wasn't another soul for miles, excepting those inside.

For a long moment they just stared at it, featureless as it was, but they didn’t have the time to waste. The second the Court realized that Roman was dead, they would track Kris and the others down. They had been seen entering and exiting the schoolhouse, and no doubt had heard the shot that ended the Spymaster. They probably had mere minutes. Kris climbed out first, slamming the door behind him, and JC and Cam followed suit. When Kris drew his pistol (one of them – he had the both of them tucked in his waistline, and an extra clip of bullets in his boot), they did the same. Cam cocked their shotgun and swallowed audibly.

“One o’ y’all wanna check for a backdoor?” Kris said under his breath. JC nodded and jogged around the building, leaving Kris and Cam alone.

“So, plan?” Cam’s voice was shaking. Seeing them scared was strange – usually they were the first one inside, first one shooting, last one standing. Now they were shaking like a chihuahua.

“It’s gonna be fine, Cam,” he assured them as best he could, but it didn’t calm them one bit. Maybe they could tell he wasn’t so sure, himself. “I’m gonna try the door. You’re comin’ in after me. JC can keep ‘em from comin’ ‘round or gettin’ away.”

“And the guards?”

“Wound ‘em, take their guns.” He considered for a moment, then added, “They’re mostly gonna be Infantry. You know that. Most guards are, if they ain’t Security. They shouldn’t be too big a deal.”

Cam swallowed again, nodding. “And if they are?”

“They won’t be.” He was damn sure of that, at least. Infantry were nothing. Security might pose a problem, and if Andrea was here there was no doubt at least one, but he could take them if Cam couldn't.

“And what about Andrea?”

“I’ll grab him. I've got questions-”

Cam’s eyes went wide. “Are you gonna interrogate _him_ like you interrogated _me?_ Like you did Roman?”

Kris shrugged. “If I gotta. I hope I won’t have to, but honestly, as much as I care for the kid, I know I can’t trust him as far as I can throw him.” He rolled a shoulder, smirked. “Besides, I like chokin’ folks.”

“You’re fucked up, Kris,” Cam grumbled, and Kris laughed.

“You’re just noticing that now?”

Cam pressed their back to the wall by the door, knuckles white on their shotgun, and Kris tried the doorknob, just in case. Locked, of course.

“Gonna kick it down?” Cam asked, and Kris didn’t respond before he stepped back and kicked out, solidly, against the door near the knob. There was a crack, metal against metal and wood bending under his boot. The door snapped open.

“Wha-?” A guard just there, standing by the door, turned around slow, shocked. Kris grabbed him and spun him back around until he faced front, and pulled him close, forearm against his throat. He pressed his gun to the side of his face and looked around, keeping his grip tight.

There was no one in the immediate vicinity, the room dry and hollow like an old bone. Kris licked his dry lips, sucking in the hot air, and frowned. It was - and Kris nearly rolled his eyes at the cliché -  _too_ quiet. A square, empty room, a hallway to the left, and a view of the roof through a balcony that circled the walls. From what Kris could see there were no doors upstairs, aside from a hall that probably connected to the downstairs hallway as the way up.

There was a distant slamming of doors that grew louder, and Kris stayed silent until JC stumbled in through a door at the back of the empty room, gun held out in front of him. When he saw Kris he drooped.

“This the only guy?” he asked, gesturing to Kris’s hostage. Kris shrugged.

“I reckon so,” he said, carefully. JC searched the guard while Kris held him still, and took away his pistol and the spare clips in his jeans pockets, tossing them in a faraway corner. Kris kicked out one of the guy’s knees and threw him to the floor, where he hissed in a breath through his nose.

“Cam, check down there.” Kris gestured toward the hallway and Cam nodded, holding out their shotgun and disappearing. There was a sound of heavy footfalls going upstairs and they reappeared on the balcony. “Anything?”

“Nope.”

“Alright, get back down here.” He diverted his attention back to the guard. “Who’re you?” Kris asked, stepping further into the room. He kept his gun trained at the guy’s head. Cam silently took to the guard's post.

“I’m- I’m a guard,” the guy stammered. “I work for the C-Court, s-so if you kill me they’ll-”

“We just killed Spymaster Roman, kid,” Kris said. “You think we give a rat’s ass what the Court’s gonna do ta us?”

The poor kid went pale. He was Latino, probably Mexican, and with no accent to speak of. Short curly hair, crooked nose. Impulsively, Kris wanted to crack it back the other way.

“What’s your name?” JC asked. He had his gun pointed at the kid, too.

“I- José Padron,” he said, quickly. He looked from JC to Cam, then back to JC. “Wait, you- you guys are the Heist Squad, right?” His expression morphed from fear to pure horror when he looked back at Kris. “You used to be Hazard,” he breathed, and his eyes teared up.

Kris scowled. “I still am, kid.” José shut up. Kris kept the scowl up. The problem with being bare-faced all the damn time- he had to keep his expression intimidating. He couldn’t fall neutral or bored without the tape, no matter how annoyed he was. “I’m gonna ask you a couple questions. If you don’t answer, I’ll shoot you. Understood?” José nodded, holding up his hands, propped up on his elbows.

Kris wanted to shout, repeat himself looking for a more submissive answer, but shifted his weight restlessly instead. He didn’t have time for that. He had to find Andrea.

“Aw, Hazard, leave the poor kid alone.” Absolutely deadpan, deep voice, English accent. Kris cursed under his breath.

“I should’a guessed this was a goddamn trap,” Kris said, turning around to see Park stood in the doorway, shoulders broad enough to almost touch both sides. Cam hadn't made a noise, stumbling back from the door and- and still hadn't  _shot_ em, despite being in range. Ey stared at him, looking bored and dead-eyed. “Y’all use this place for ambushes?” The balcony was perfect for a firing squad. A couple poor suckers come in the front or back door, they'd end up in the line of fire quick as anything. Suckers like Kris, apparently. If Kris had let Roman survive, the place would've been full to bursting with Security and Infantry.

“You killed Roman,” ey said, ignoring the question. “Why?”

“I’m lookin’ for somebody,” Kris said. “An' he deserved it, ‘cause he sent us to this shithole. Probably tryin’ ta buy time.”

Park glowered. “Who the fuck are you lookin’ for out here?”

Kris looked at Cam, who was steadfastly staring at Park’s feet, eyes wide and shotgun lowered like a small animal, tryin' not to be seen. JC was staring at Kris and keeping his gun on José, and when Kris looked to him he gestured like Kris should lower his gun. Kris looked back at Park and pointedly didn’t.

“Andrea,” he said, and Park raised eir, uh, eyebrow skin.

“That kid you killed three years ago?” ey said, like ey was genuinely puzzled. Like ey had genuinely forgotten.

“You and I both know that’s not what happened.”

Park smirked. “You’ve been seeing ghosts, Hazard?” Ey stepped into the room, and was followed by a couple guards. Backup. “Perez knockin’ you upside the head back when we first met must have really fucked up your sense of reality.” Patronizing, like ey knew Kris already knew the truth and was just picking on him. Kris flexed his hands on the pistol in his hand.

“She must’ve,” he agreed, conversationally. “She’s got quite the arm.”

“I’ve spoken to her,” Park said, cutting the shit right quick. “And the Queen. They’re not happy with you.”

“I can’t imagine they would be.” Kris glanced at JC again while Cam and Park moved to let Park’s backup in. Six guys, normal Infantry guards. A couple of them looked at José with something like worry, or pity, but most of them were emotionless, aiming for intimidating.

“They want you done with,” ey continued. “All three of you. And they’d usually just send my boys here, but you’re the Heist Squad. My protégés, my brain child, and now I have to kill you.”

“I’m as devastated as you are,” JC said, and Park broke a smile, broad and sharp.

“I wanted to get a piece of the action,” ey said. “Your blood is mine, and I intend to spill it.”

 

Catching Kris off guard and making him jump, JC shot first, catching Park in the side just below eir rib cage. Ey grimaced, grunting, and brought up eir own gun, aiming at Kris instead of eir actual attacker.

Kris dived across the short space between them and tackled Park to the ground, dropping his pistol to grab at Park’s and straddling eir middle. Park shouted an order for the guards to attack and Cam and JC both took three at once, getting too close for the amateurs to aim at with their too-big guns. Cam was amazing to watch, way more skilled at hand-to-hand combat than at aiming a weapon, but Kris couldn’t watch them, preoccupied with Park.

Eir head was hanging out the doorway, the threshold probably uncomfortable, situated unforgivingly about eir shoulder blades. Kris snatched eir gun and tossed it outside into the heat, out of reach. Park roared, feral like an animal, and changed eir approach by putting eir free hand around Kris’s neck, clutching hard enough with eir nails to draw blood, and Kris gagged, gasped. He held eir right hand down with his own.

“The Queen will have your head,” ey said, and Kris lashed out with his left fist, breaking one of the hinges to Park's glasses and tearing a gash across the bridge of eir nose. His eyesight was blacking out around the edges already – Park’s hands were bigger, stronger than Kris’s own. 

He needed to- to  _shoot,_ before he blacked out. He glanced at his and Park's pistols, black and wavering in the heat outside. Park couldn't retaliate with eir hands so ey brought eir knee up, hard, bruising Kris's spine and making his spare pistol dig into his skin.

Oh. Shit.

There was a screeching of tires skidding on a road of sand and rocks when Kris drew his pistol made short work of Park, armed with this new information and feeling more than a little like an idiot. Red blood stained green hair and Kris huffed a breath, his throbbing head supplying unseasonable Christmas jokes. He blamed it on the hand now falling slack around his throat. The lack of oxygen must've fucked him up. It was tough work, trying to keep Park down instead of trying to claw that scarred hand away from his windpipe.

Stars blinking in his vision, Kris drew himself to his feet, leaning too-hard against the door frame, coughing hard. Shuddering, he turned his back to the outside. JC was holding his own against two guys now, and five were slumped, bleeding on the ground, not including Park.

Wait, that made- Kris's head was swimming and- and maybe his math was wrong, but that made seven.

Park had only brought six guys.


	27. "You don't owe me shit."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Heist Crew reunites.

_“CAM!_ _”_ shouted a voice from Kris’s side and he jumped, then was shoved aside as someone pushed past him. “Cam, oh my god-”

“Andrea?” Kris murmured, head starting to clear. Andrea crouched over one of the bodies, brushing black hair from a sweat-stained forehead, hands trembling. He dropped a white case on the ground at their side, opening it hurriedly and jostling its contents.

“Cam, Cameron, can you hear me?” Andrea said softly, quickly. He tore open their shirt where it was stained the worst to expose the wound in their stomach, directly below their rib cage under their left breast. “Wrecker, please stay with me-“

“Andrea?” Cam breathed, eyelids twitching. Kris wanted to grab Andrea and question him but- Cam was in bad shape if the kid’s hands were shaking like that. He didn’t want to interrupt.

“Holy shit,” JC shouted from behind him. Kris turned to watch him plant a bullet in a guy’s skull with an Infantry rifle. “I- He’s alive!”

The guard wobbled and collapsed. Kris gathered himself, forcing himself to breathe, and took one of the guards the same way he’d taken so many before, forearm around the throat. He turned toward where José had crawled off to while no one had been looking, inches away from his gun, and Kris took a couple shots at him before killing the guy he was holding, getting a little blood and brain on his own face, which he wiped off with a grimace. Everyone was dead but the four of them.

There was a long silence while Andrea worked, forearms bloodstained and working carefully. Kris couldn’t see what he was doing, exactly, but the kid worked for a full half hour before he sat back and huffed a breath. He’d been murmuring to Cam the whole time, too low to hear, maybe to himself.

“They’ll be okay,” Andrea said at last, taking one of Cam’s arms over his shoulders and helping them to their feet. They wobbled but not as hard as Kris would have thought, and shot him and JC a grin.

“Yeah, I’m- I’m cool,” they said. Their eyes were unfocused and they looked more than a little scared. They looked down at their middle and then quickly back up again, swallowing a shaky laugh.

JC stepped up behind Kris, just behind his shoulder like a child, peering around an adult fearfully. His breath was labored, tired.

“We need to get moving,” JC said lowly, like he didn’t have it in him to get excited at seeing Andrea alive for the first time. Andrea nodded.

“Let’s get somewhere safe; I know a safehouse-” But Kris cut him off, holding up a hand.

“You and me need to talk first, kid,” he said, and Andrea stared up at him.

Andrea swallowed. “Kris, c’mon, we don’t-”

Kris growled and shoved him against the wall behind him by the neck. Cam let him go and swayed dangerously until JC took Andrea’s place under their arm.

“Dude, right now?!” Cam exclaimed, sounding exasperated, but Kris pretended he couldn’t hear them. Andrea writhed, gasping, cheek pressed against the rough wall harder than was comfortable. His toes couldn’t find purchase on the ground no matter how he tried. He was taller than he’d been at sixteen by a good bit, but still not taller than Kris.

“You’re gonna answer my questions, Andrea,” Kris said, ignoring JC and Cam for now, the smell of blood sickening in his nostrils, made cloying and thick by the heat. He was on edge, could feel his blood rushing under his skin. This whole damn place had been a trap – how did he know Andrea wasn’t a part of it? “Or I’m gonna choke you like I did Cam when they told me you were alive. Understood?”

Andrea nodded, but it scraped his face too hard. _“_ _S-si,_ _”_ he said, and Kris wanted to smash his skull against the wall. He knew everything Andrea said was probably calculated, even more so than it used to be, and he was perfectly capable of using English under pressure. The use of his mother tongue was, like everything, measured. Kris was more than a little wary of Andrea, despite the part of him that knew the kid was as much a victim as he was. He was still a liar by trade and had three years to perfect his art. Not to mention he'd let Kris get run the fuck over last time Kris tried to get answers out of him.

Kris moved his arm, rubbing Andrea only a little against the wall and leaning close. “Where the fuck have you been?” he asked, making sure to breathe directly on the kid’s ear. Andrea swallowed audibly.

“I- Since the heist? Asleep, mostly,” Andrea replied, voice shaking. “I- I was in a coma for a year, then in physical therapy and the like for another one. I’ve only- I’ve only been back to work for a couple months.”

So two year awake. “And you never wanted to look me up? Thought it was funny I was up to my fuckin’ ears in guilt?” That was unfair, Kris knew, but he couldn’t help it. He could taste fear, guilt, self-hatred in the back of his throat like bile.

Andrea writhed some more. “Every second I was awake I wanted to find you,” he said, quietly. He was already flushed from the heat and excitement, but Kris imagined he grew redder. “I kept up with everything you did. I could recite your whole Court record.” He laughed, self-deprecating and brittle. JC stared at them both, an expression Kris couldn’t read on his face. Cam had their eyes closed, breathing deeply, controlled.

Something in Kris felt like it was about to shatter and take his strength with it. His arm shook where he was holding Andrea up, and his anger felt like thin glass. Seeing Cam the way they had been, all slumped and blood-soaked, had really thrown him off. If Andrea hadn’t arrived, when he had-

“I’m sorry, Kris,” Andrea said, at length, and Kris finally dropped him, turning his back on the others so he could catch his breath, compose himself. There were bodies everywhere, six guards and Park in the doorway, and the stench made him want to vomit. His eyes burned.

“How did you know we were here?” JC asked, taking over while Kris calmed down, busied himself grabbing everyone’s guns and ammo and setting them by the door. Park’s gun was gone when he went to pick up his own from outside.

“I was- I was with Roman when you killed him,” Andrea said. “I had come to him to tell him that- that Kris knew I was alive, and to ask him if I could stop hiding. He was refusing me when you showed up, and locked me in the closet.”

“Why didn’t you make any noise? We could’a broken you out.” JC frowned.

“I thought-” Andrea choked on emotion, and Kris felt all his anger at the kid fade. “Roman said you hated me. He said that you blamed me for having to join the Court, Kris. And he said that you and Cam were too scared of him to disobey.” That last part aimed at JC, who snorted.

“Yeah, Cam- uh, Cam was,” he said. “They wanted to turn us in, but uh. I guess Kris was the immediate danger, over their fear of the Queen.”

“And you, JC?” Andrea asked. “Why did you follow Kris?”

JC went silent. “I followed him because I think he’s right. What the Queen did was fucked. You and him both deserve justice.” Kris came back to them, breath even and hands steady. He crossed his arms over his chest. JC shrugged, awkward under Cam’s weight. “And he’s my friend. He’s saved my life more than once. I owe him.”

“You don’t owe me shit, Jace, but I appreciate the sentiment,” Kris said. “You’ve saved my ass more times than I can count.”

“I didn’t overcome my greatest fear to do so, though,” JC said, probably referring to the burning building thing like he thought he had a point, and maybe he did.

Kris knew his fear of fire definitely wasn’t ‘overcome,’ and he shrugged it off. “If that’s what you wanna call it, sure.” He turned back to Andrea. “Where’s Park’s gun?”

Andrea stilled. “Excuse me?”

“Park’s gun,” Kris reiterated, gesturing out the front door. “It was on the ground. I know you took it. Where is it?”

After a long pause, Andrea reached into his waistline and tugged out the pistol. Had he learned that from Kris? “I- I heard the fighting. And the gunfire,” he admitted, by way of explanation. Kris held out his hand and Andrea handed it to him, hand stained dark with Cam's blood. Without a thought, Kris tossed it toward the pile of firearms and Andrea, Cam, and JC flinched when it connected with a clatter.

Kris ignored them and moved on, putting his gun back in his pants and shoving his hands in his pockets. Casual. “So, are you planning on sticking around?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” Andrea said slowly.

Kris nodded. “Good. We’re killing the Queen. Where is she?”

Andrea’s eyes went wide as a deer’s, mouth snapping open and closed. “Wh-what?”

“We’re killing the Queen, Andrea.” JC was amused at the reaction, and maybe Kris’s deadpan delivery. “C’mon, get with the program, kid.”

“Don’t call me that,” Andrea snapped, then looked at Kris’s expression and flushed. “I’m nineteen, now. I’m not a kid.”

“Ya didn’t say anything when I called ya ‘kid,’” Kris pointed out, eyebrows raised, and Andrea turned further red. He looked at Kris, like he was saying ‘it’s okay when it’s you’ with his eyes. Kris’s own cheeks felt a little warm, but so did the rest of him.

“The Queen is at El Palacio,” Andrea said, changing the subject. His Spanish was pointedly flawless. “Like she always is.”

“Shit,” JC said. “No one knows where El Palacio is. How are we-?”

Andrea cut him off. “It’s- I know where it is. She trusts me.”

“Who’s gonna be there?” Kris asked. He didn’t want to be caught off guard again. “This was a fuckin’ circus.”

“This was a trap,” Andrea said. “You know that by now. I've never heard of or seen this place before, but it looks like it was built for ambush. Was it this heavily guarded when you got here?”

Kris shook his head. “Park brought six of ‘em. José over there-” Kris pointed at the body in the far corner. “-was here when we got here. We was about to interrogate him when Park interrupted.”

Andrea nodded, slowly. “That makes sense. This is the second most secret building the Court has, I think. I looked through Roman’s things for a long time and still couldn’t find the address. I was able to follow Park until a point, but I lost em just outside the city. I found the way eventually, but I was... late.”

He swallowed. “Anyway, I- El Palacio is pretty well-guarded in the front room. All the other doors are steel reinforced and locked in a hundred different ways, so the only way in is the front. Upstairs is the Queen’s quarters, where she’ll no doubt have Perez and Lewinsky at her beck and call.”

“Who _is_ Lewinsky?” Kris asked. “Cam said they were in the High Court, but I’ve never heard of ‘em.”

“Lewinsky’s the Chancellor, and as such is in charge of Court finances and most high-level operations,” Andrea recited. He looked over at Park’s body and grimaced. “Like how the late Park and Roman were the High Admiral and Spymaster, respectively. He's practically the Queen's right-hand man.

“He’s not the big deal here, though. Perez is going to be the biggest threat if you attack the Queen. Even Park said once, while ey was training me personally, that ey’d never want to fight her.”

“I can take ‘er,” Kris said, and Andrea frowned.

“If you say so,” Andrea said. “And then there’s Lewinsky, who isn’t a great fighter but always wears a vest, at least. Very paranoid.”

“Shoot him in the head then,” JC said, and Andrea shrugged like that hadn’t been what he’d been getting at, but JC wasn’t wrong. “Easy.”

“With twenty guards coming at you all at once?” Andrea barked a cynical laugh that made Kris want to back up from him. Kris guessed his job of toughening the kid up had worked, somewhere between living together and shooting him in the head. “I’d like to see you two try. You’re going to need a better plan than, ‘step one: roll up, step two: shoot some guys.’”

“So you wanna tell us what our new plan is, then?” Kris asked, rolling his eyes. Andrea glared at him.

“I’ll need some more time to think about it,” he said, half thoughtfully. “Can we head somewhere that isn’t so hot?”

“The car’s got AC,” Kris said, and Andrea nodded.

“We can go to that safehouse I was talking about,” he said. “I saw its address while I was going through Roman’s things. It’s old and unused, but you guys can break the locks and-”

“We’re going to El Palacio,” Kris interrupted gruffly. Cam opened their mouth as if to counter him, but the look he shot them shut them up. They settled more of their weight onto JC and stared at the ground.

Andrea pulled a face like Kris had lost his mind, eyes wide and brow furrowed. “But Kris, the planning this stupid stunt will entail-”

“I’ve killed two of the High Court personally today,” Kris said, brandishing his pistol, and Andrea stared at it, swallowing. “I’ve got a spare clip in my boot and half a clip left in this thing, plus the other pistol back here.” He patted at his lower back lightly. “That’s my plan.”

“You’ll fucking die!” Andrea exclaimed. The kid’s language caught Kris off guard but he ignored it.

Kris shrugged. “You don’t gotta come with me.”

“I think we can do this and get out intact,” JC said. “I don’t think anyone else is stupid enough to try. Her Majesty won’t be prepared.”

Andrea scowled as he plucked the front of his shirt from his sweaty front, trying to air out. “Let’s- Fine, let’s get to the car.”

Kris looked at Cam, the bloody bandages on their middle and their limp. “How are you feelin’, Cam? Up to it?” he said, surprising even himself with his gentle tone. He hadn’t thought- he knew some of them would get hurt, but seeing it made him a little nervous. For all that Cam was, uh, _difficult,_ he still considered them a friend. Or he _had,_ until the Andrea business had come up.

They shrugged, winced. “I’ll survive,” they said, letting go of JC and standing on their own. Most of the limp and wobbliness seemed to have evaporated. “I- I should go back to La Sierra.”

“What for?” JC asked.

They rolled a shoulder and shifted their weight, watching their feet and testing their balance. After a deep breath they met his eyes. “I wanna grab our shit from our quarters.” They smiled, lopsided. “I’ve got a feelin’ we’re gonna have to get as far away from this city as we can and I want my videogames.”

“Cam, are you fuckin’ kiddin’ me?” Kris sneered. “Y’all should’a grabbed y’all’s shit last night!”

“I grabbed mine,” JC said, putting his hands up in an ‘it wasn’t me!’ gesture.

Cam rolled their eyes. “I was at Paloma’s and I forgot, alright? Christ.” Of course they went and got drunk. Typical. They’d probably been lying about their dry streak. Kris rolled his eyes. Cam put a hand on their waist and cocked their hip. “And I can arrange a better getaway. How does a jet sound to you, JC?”

“That’s a good idea,” Andrea supplied. “The Court has helicopters, and trackers on all their cars. JC’s a good getaway driver, but he’s not a miracle worker.”

Kris turned his glare on the kid, then back on Cam. They were right, weren’t they? A jet would be a great getaway. And flashy. The imagined thrill of stealing a plane had his heart pumping.

Instead of saying anything, he turned to JC and raised his eyebrows, wordlessly requesting his opinion.

JC shrugged. “It sounds smart to me, Kris." He turned to Cam. "Can you drive? We have three cars here now.”

“I’ll be fine,” Cam said. “If Kris lets me go.”

All three of them turned to Kris expectantly, and he nodded quickly. Sometimes he forgot that on top of being the de facto leader of this stupid stunt, he was the oldest person here. They looked up to him. He was reminded of his little sisters back home – Jess and Louise – and the way they’d hang on every word he and their brother Scott would say.

Cam accepted his approval and made to leave, brushing his bicep with their hand gently as they passed. “I’ll see you guys later,” they said, offering a smile that didn’t reach before disappearing outside.

“So, ah, we’re going straight to El Palacio?” Andrea asked, and JC nodded.

“That’s the plan,” Kris said. “Unless you think you can make up a better plan on the ride?”

The kid wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I- I can try.”

That had to be enough. “Good. Let’s go.”


	28. "You've never what?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris and JC share a moment before El Palacio.

Kris took Cam’s spot in the passenger seat, and it was strange not being in the backseat for the first time. Andrea didn’t take Kris’s spot in the middle, unbuckled and leaning too far forward in between the front seats, but instead buckled himself into the window seat behind Kris, staring out the window while he thought. The AC was a welcome reprieve from the unforgiving heat while JC followed Cam back to the city. Andrea only knew the way from there – he wasn’t sure where they were, out here in the desert.

“How’s the plan comin’, kid?” Kris asked, and Andrea huffed out a breath.

“About as well as it was going two minutes ago, last time you asked me,” he said, frustrated. “I only wish you’d had more foresight-”

“That’s what makes me exciting though, _Andrea._ _”_ He stressed the kid’s first name. He didn’t call him that often, and it made Andrea blush. Kris wondered if the kid still had feelings for him, but he wasn’t about to ask.

“It makes you _something,_ though I’m not sure if ‘exciting’ is the word,” JC said, grinning over at Kris. Something in Kris got tight and he imagined seeing that grin after the Queen was dead, running away from La Sierra to escape the wrath of the dying Court. Just Kris and JC and Cam, off to make a new life far away from this pisshole. He smiled back, laughing sarcastically.

“Really funny, Jace.”

For some reason, he couldn’t imagine Andrea being there, in that best case scenario. Though part of him wished it wasn’t so, Kris was still wary, distrustful of the kid and the way he was so silent, yet so open when he spoke. He was giving up information too freely, but maybe that was just Kris’s presence. He’d had to hurt more than one person recently in order to get the info he wanted; Andrea’s trust in him was jarring.

When they were back in the city, on top of trying to work out some sort of plan, Andrea started giving JC directions to El Palacio. They drove south for the better part of an hour, closer to the Mexican border than Kris had been in a long time. He could practically smell the barbed wire, cocaine, and racism from here. He taped up his face and neck, but without his jacket to hide his arms he didn't bother to do his palms.

“You sure it’s this far south?” JC asked, and Andrea nodded.

“Yeah, and by the beach. It’s a huge mansion, pink like the inside of a seashell.”

Kris furrowed his brow. “And no one knows about it? It’s big and pink and ten feet from the damn border.”

Andrea shrugged. “I don’t know how the Queen does it, but she does. She has her ways, I suppose.”

The car fell silent and they drew closer to the coast, and Kris got an eyeful of the glittering Pacific under the setting sun through the slit in his tape. It was getting late and Kris was unsure if the cover of darkness would be a blessing or a hindrance.

“Pull- pull onto the beach, here,” Andrea said, and when Kris looked at him in the rear-view he was tearing up. It wasn’t as almost-endearing as it had been when he was a kid, and Kris felt the same urge to punch him as he did last time he’d seen Andrea cry. Kris found the kid’s waterworks almost suspicious, like he had his use of Italian in El Escondite. Andrea had been completely composed a second ago. Broken floodgates or acting?

“What’s wrong, Andrea?” JC stopped where the asphalt met white sand and turned around in his seat to look Andrea in the face.

“I- We’re here, it’s a short walk from here to El- to El Palacio,” the kid stammered, shaking a little. “And I- I mean, I've been thinking and there’s no way you guys are surviving this, and we can’t go back now that Roman and Park are dead, so I guess this is-” He sniffled, and Kris thumped his head against the back of his seat in annoyance. JC shot him a look that Kris ignored. They didn’t have time for this.

“This isn’t goodbye,” JC reassured him, as gently than Kris had ever heard him. JC steeled himself. “You can wait here. Kris and I are gonna go in, and we’ll figure it out. We’re the Heist Squad. Or, at least, half of it. We can do this.”

“And you just- you want me to wait here? In the car?” Andrea looked kind of offended, but JC nodded.

“We’re not letting you die again,” he said, and he sounded way more confident in their chances than Kris had expected. Something like dread was crawling up his spine like rising water, priming to drown him. He felt like- like El Escondite had been a failure as much as a success. He'd killed Park and everyone had gotten out alive, but The Queen knew they were coming and had probably known for _hours._ She could have prepared in any number of ways, or run away. They were down one of their number and, honestly, they were lucky Cam hadn’t _died._ They wouldn’t get that lucky again. His luck had run out years ago.

It didn’t matter though – he couldn’t stop now. If he was going to die tonight, he at least wanted to take as much of the Court down with him as he could.

“JC’s right,” Kris said at last, turning around to look at Andrea, too. “If you get out of this car and get yourself killed, I will dump your body in the ocean when we get back.”

JC shoved his shoulder, but he grinned. Kris grinned back, hidden by tape but visible in his eyes.

Andrea wasn’t grinning, but they locked him in and left without him anyway.

\--

Stepping out of the car felt as solemn as walking toward death. Kris ignored the way his stomach was tight, the way it boiled and rolled nervously under his skin, the way he felt himself trembling. He looked at JC to find him staring.

 _We are going to die,_ some nervous part of him was saying, but- well, he hadn't ever faced  _worse_ odds, but he'd faced and survived just about equal odds before.

“Nervous?” Kris asked, forcing his free hand into his pocket to keep it from shaking. The other was sweating on the grip of his pistol.

JC nodded, glancing back over his shoulder at the car. Kris could feel the heat of the sand through the soles of his boots, hyper-aware of the way his feet shifted and sank in the sand, of the hard press of his spare clip to the knob of his ankle.

“He’s gonna be fine,” JC muttered, like Kris wasn’t meant to hear him. “He’ll be fine,” he said, more surely, turning straight ahead. They still couldn’t see El Palacio, but there was a long, quiet stretch of beach between them and where Andrea said it was. They slid down the sandy hill to the beach itself, leaving the car behind for good. “We’ll be fine, Kris.”

Kris nodded. “O’ course.”

The road directly in front of the car wasn’t bordered by sand but by dead grass atop a short, stony cliff that now towered above Kris and JC, jutting in and out of the land and effectively keeping it separate from the beach. The stone was dark and jagged, streaked white by old salt. The waves lapped gently at the shore and all was calm, setting Kris’s nerves on edge in anticipation.

They turned around the edge of the cliff and saw where it dipped inland and out again, creating a large alcove protected from wind. In his mind’s eye Kris could imagine a family picnic, tents and towels and shouting children in the water, adults cracking open a beer and watching the sunset. Secluded and peaceful.

“It’s really beautiful out here,” JC said suddenly, and Kris hadn’t even realize he’d stopped walking to stare at their surroundings. Kris turned around.

“I guess,” he said.

JC didn’t have his gun out like Kris did, his hands in his pants pockets. He turned to face Kris, the blood red sunset setting the side of his face ablaze. It was really getting late; they needed to get moving. Kris stayed put, locked in a staring contest.

“You okay?” he asked, lowly, approaching JC. JC shrugged, turning back to face the ocean.

“Not really,” he said. “We really... we really fucked up, I think. Maybe Andrea was right.”

Kris snorted. “Yeah, maybe this wasn’t a great idea. Day in the life, I guess.” He paused. “I’m sorry I dragged y’all into this. I’m sorry Cam got hurt.”

“It’s okay,” JC said through a sigh. “I don’t think this could have gone any better. I wish I’d gotten to fly something. This would have been way more fun with a stolen military jet.”

“You fly those often?”

“Most of my flying is on contracts, but the occasional heist has put me in the air. I’ve got friends at the base up north.”

“Maybe Cam’ll hook you up. They should be getting it ready as we speak.”

They lapsed into silence, and after a while Kris looked up and down the beach, where they’d come from and where they were going. They _really_ needed to go.

“We really need to go,” Kris said, at length. He looked back at JC and he was biting his lip. “What’s wrong?”

JC pushed his glasses up to rub at his dry eyes, taking a deep breath, then turned to look at Kris. “I have... a confession to make,” he said. “If we’re gonna die tonight, I don’t want to have any regrets.”

Kris tensed up. _What?_ “We’re not gonna die,” he said. He was about to continue when JC got close, too close, breath ghosting across his tape. Kris swallowed (more like gulped) and stared, eyes flicking from JC’s eyes, settled intensely on Kris’s face, to his mouth. _Oh, god, too close_ _–_ he could see the indents JC’s glasses made on either side of his nose, his dark eyelashes, the faint freckles over his nose. JC put one hand on the side of Kris’s neck, half cradling his head and Kris knew he could feel the ruined skin there, his burns stretching high in that spot in particular. With an almost thoughtful tenderness, JC traced an edge of tape over Kris's mouth and, in a smooth motion, tugged it down under Kris's chin.

“I care about you, Kris,” JC said, breathed, then closed the distance between them and kissed Kris on the mouth.

Kris gasped, mind reeling while JC took the opening, letting his tongue prod at Kris’s, searching for more of a reaction. When Kris didn’t provide one, JC pulled back with a wet noise that made Kris shiver. JC didn’t move his hands, expression pained.

“I’m sorry,” they said in unison, JC resigned and Kris breathless.

“Don’t be!” Kris forced out before JC could pull away, his mind a mess. “I don’t- I’ve never-” His heart was in his throat again, eyes wide. He felt very vulnerable. “I- um.”

“You’ve never what?” JC asked, pulling away and stepping back. Kris swallowed around the urge to protest at the loss of contact.

“Kissed anyone,” Kris forced out before he could stop himself. His flush was down his neck now and as such was visible, and he felt like he was on fire. Back home, no one had ever, uh, expressed interest, and after Texas, he didn’t really- anyone he found attractive was kept at a distance. JC at the hospital was a special case; Kris had been hopped up on morphine and intoxicating physical contact. “I’ve, uh. Never had the chance. Or the offer.”

JC gaped at him, expressionless, and Kris wanted the earth to swallow him whole.

“Are you serious?” JC asked, and Kris couldn’t even look at him, embarrassed as he was. “You’re- _‘Never had the offer?_ _’_ You’re the hottest guy I’ve known in _years,_ Kris, holy shit I cannot even believe-” He was laughing, now, and Kris schooled his face serious, reaching up to fix his tape.

“Whatever, we need to-” He turned around but JC grabbed his upper arm, the one still holding his gun, pulling hard until Kris hit his chest, and Kris planted a hand there to steady himself. He flushed and dropped it but JC took it in his, thumbing over the back of it.

“Can I kiss you one more time?” JC asked, and their noses were already touching. Kris shrugged, stomach knotted up tight.

“I- I dunno,” he said, staring at JC’s half grin. Those lips were soft, he knew now firsthand, and his chest constricted at the thought.

“We really do need to go,” JC murmured. “And we could die in there. So, I mean, speak now or forever hold your-”

 _“_ _Fine,_ yes, kiss me,” Kris huffed, and JC barely took the time to smile before following orders.

The kiss was slow, JC taking Kris’s bottom lip between his own more gently than Kris could bear, sucking in a shuddering breath. He dropped his pistol without a thought and hesitantly brought his hands up to rest on JC’s shoulders, like a precaution so he could push away if he desired. JC slid his hand higher up Kris’s neck into his hair and tugged at the bleached strands, tilting Kris’s head and deepening the kiss.

When JC’s tongue touched at the trembling seam of Kris’s lips, asking entry, Kris opened his mouth without letting himself think about it. JC’s other hand came up to take Kris’s hip and pull their bodies flush together. Kris’s arms moved to encircle JC’s shoulders, tongue mirroring JC’s movements, imitating, experimenting. He was self-conscious, and wished it was more like he’d always anticipated – fireworks, his heart thumping too hard in his chest while his body took over for his mind-turned-mush. Instead it was hot, wet, strange, his heart in his throat from pure nervousness. The smell of sea salt and ocean air combined itself with JC’s own musk to make Kris light-headed, unsteady on his feet as JC did something with his tongue that made his knees shake.

“I think we should go,” he murmured, pulling back to breathe. “I don’t- we need to go.”

JC groaned, kissing the corner of Kris’s mouth. “You’re right,” he said, though the way he took Kris’s waist in both hands was contradictory to his statement. “The Queen’s gonna get impatient if we don’t kill her soon.”

Kris rolled his eyes, leaning forward to put his head on JC’s shoulder. Christ, he’d just had his first kiss. At _twenty-nine_. He felt like a teenager, all butterflies and sweaty palms and awkward kisses (not that JC had been awkward, no, he’d been _experienced,_ and the thought made Kris want to breathe fire or- or drown himself). Part of him wanted to jump up and down, excited and overwhelmed, hold his flaming face in his hands and scream. Another part wanted to hold JC so tight neither of them could breathe, go home and kiss him late into the night and forget about the Court.

He was too old for the first one. It was too late for the second.

“I dunno about the Queen, but Andrea’s gonna be pissed if he finds out we spent half an hour making out on the beach instead of doin’ what we’re s’posed to be,” he said, voice rough as he stepped back. His lips tingled like they were swollen and he could still taste JC on his tongue like electricity, like licking a battery. He fixed his tape.

“I guess you’re right,” JC said, and licked at his lips. Kris swallowed, and maybe he could convince himself to wait a couple more minutes-

Air chopping up, blades cutting through the air with too much force, loud and distant and fast. Off the way they’d come, a black dot on the scarlet sky- A helicopter.

“They know we’re coming and they’re gettin’ her out,” he said as JC turned to see it, too. _Fuck_ _,_ they had spent too much on the beach! Kris wanted to shoot himself for being such an idiot, but instead JC grabbed his hand and started running in the opposite direction, toward where El Palacio was supposed to be. Running in the sand was a struggle against nature and Kris’s feet slid out from under him, but JC didn’t have any trouble with it, keeping him steady like an anchor.

El Palacio was exactly as Andrea had described, a magnificent mass of wood and stone all in pearl pink turned orange by the setting sun. There was a zig-zagging staircase facing the beach that led up to the porch, and JC squeezed Kris’s hand one last time before dropping it to take the steps three at a time, Kris keeping up as best he could.

The helicopter was growing in the distance, menacing and omen-like in the approaching darkness. Kris forced himself to look away from it and at the broad white front doors. The glass inset was faceted and blurry, but Kris could see that the room beyond was lit up gleaming gold, and several dark shapes stood in wait. In the middle, in front of a mass of white that rose up high, were two figures that in particular stood out, one particularly tall and dark and the other short and rotund.

Kris went for his pistol and remembered he’d left it on the beach, dropped in the heat of the moment. Cursing to himself, he pulled out his spare from his waistband, hoping it would be enough.

“Ready?” he asked, turning to JC. They couldn’t be too long – he was sure the people on the other side of the door could see them.

Wordlessly, JC grabbed him by the collar and kissed him soundly on top of his tape, before stepping back. “I hope so.”

Kris nodded, breathless. He cleared his throat. “Let’s do this shit.”


	29. "I have to do it."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> El Palacio.

They opened the double doors in unison, holding their guns out. Before the chaos ensued, Kris had time to observe several things at once.

One. The two central figures were Perez and a man with a well-groomed moustache in a gray suit. His mousy brown comb over simultaneously made him seem like a non-threat and like the deadliest man in the room. Lewinsky, then.

Two. There were twelve guards in the room. Not all of them were armed, but if they were assigned here of all places, they were loyal and dangerous. There were more women than men in the crowd - chance or a preference of Her Majesty, Kris didn’t know.

Three. The room was more opulent than it needed to be. A sweeping staircase that was wider at its base was the centerpiece, or maybe it was the chandelier directly above and center, throwing crystal glitters of gold and white light in all directions, half illuminating and half blinding. The floor was gleaming hardwood under fourteen pairs of black boots, Lewinsky’s black loafers, and JC’s white sneakers.

Four, there was a long hallway up the stairs, but straight up was a door that seemed to be made of glass and gold, frosted like the front door but not so thick. Kris had a feeling the Queen was up there.

Five, the helicopter was too close. JC wasn’t close enough. Kris could hardly breathe through the tension in the air. Maybe he should have insisted Cam stay with them. Maybe he should have let Andrea come with them. But it was too late.

Then the chaos fell.

Or, well. The chandelier did.

Kris raised his gun and shot at the ceiling before anything else, twice in rapid succession and there was a deafening crack and creak. The guards all drew back and Lewinsky tripped over himself backwards up the stairs while glass went everywhere. Perez turned tail and sprinted upstairs before Kris could shoot her, and then there were guards on him.

A couple were already down, nursing injuries with glass or crystal or gilded metal sticking out of their legs, but most of them charged Kris and JC. Kris shot one in the stomach and kicked her over into the glass where she writhed, and was quickly replaced. The guard swung a fist around, and Kris ducked, narrowly missing getting hit. He didn’t miss the other fist, but by the time that hit Kris in the jaw he had his own arm up, twisting around the guy’s neck and flipping him around, crushing his windpipe with his free arm. Hands came up to claw at his bare arm but he ignored it with grit teeth, taking out two more guards with his pistol.

He could hear JC and guards alike grunting, shouting, but there was no opening for Kris to look over at him no matter how much he wanted to. He dropped his meat shield when the guy went unconscious, slack body too heavy to hold up. Kris wasn’t wearing a vest, or any armor at all, just a sweat-stained white t-shirt between him and any bullet aimed at him, but he hoped to take out the shooter before the shot could be taken. He did just that, getting a would-be shooter in the shoulder and then in the head. He was trying to keep track of how many bullets of the 15 shot clip were left in his head, but he was getting lost. Belatedly, maybe unrelatedly, he realized he hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast and it was late evening already. His stomach felt like it was tearing itself to pieces and his head was swimming.

He shouldn’t have been as shocked as he was when he finally got shot.

 _“_ _KRIS!_ _”_ JC shouted before Kris could even register, staring down at the stain on his hip, blood oozing slowly from the wound. It wasn’t bad, didn’t seem to even hit anything important, but he still wanted to fall to his knees and hold it. Instead he snarled, finding the shooter – one of those who’d stayed low to pull glass from their leg – and stomped over to kick them right in the head, knocking them over. The gun skidded from their hands when he stomped once more, right down on their face, breaking their nose with a satisfying crack. They only had time to groan for a second before he put a bullet in them.

All the guards closest to him finally taken care of, Kris let himself check on JC. He was holding his own, and within seconds he was done, surrounded by bodies. He didn’t seem to have a scratch on him, and sprinted over to Kris with inhuman speed. Kris’s vision was spinning.

“Kris, oh my god, are you alright?” JC asked, crouching down to Kris’s level, and Kris realized he’d fallen to his knees. There was glass in them, tearing his skin to ribbons and making him hurt ever more.

Kris nodded, and his head ached with the movement. “I- yeah, I-”

JC kissed his forehead, affectionate and grounding. Kris forced his eyes to stay open, willing the blackness away. He wanted to rest so bad, but god, they were so close already.

“I’m gonna go get the Queen,” JC said, lowly, soothingly. “Start taking your tape off so you can breathe, I'll be-”

Kris’s heart, which had felt sluggish and heavy before, sped up. “No,” he said, voice rough and hard to understand. JC couldn’t take Perez. He coughed hard several times, choking on blood. “I- No, Jace, _I_ have to do it.”

“You _can_ _’_ _t_ do it, you’re too badly hurt.” There were tears in JC’s eyes, his face morphing into something ugly. Was he crying? “I only just got you, I’m not losing you yet.” He pushed up his glasses to wipe the moisture from his eyes, breath ragged on Kris’s face. He pressed their foreheads together. “I’m going to go kill the Queen. And then I will come get you, and then we’ll go get Andrea and Cam and we’ll get the hell out of California. Okay?”

It sounded like the best plan in the entire world, but Kris shook his head, slowly. “No, no, I have to-”

“God damn it, Kris! You _can_ _’_ _t!_ _”_ JC grabbed both sides of Kris’s face in his hands and kissed him hard. “I’ll come back for you.”

Kris felt the adrenaline picking back up and shoved JC back, away from and off of him into the glass. He was sat by the bottom step of the stairs, and grabbed the railing to pull himself up, legs trembling weakly. JC stared up at him, but Kris couldn’t read his expression through the stars that swam in his vision.

Across the room, though, he could see movement. A body that had been laying still was pulling itself up, dressed in gray and shorter than the others-

“JC, it’s Lewinsky!” Kris shouted, pointing, and JC turned around, pulling himself to his feet and drawing his gun.

“Kris, get down!” he yelled, but Kris did the opposite, forcing his exhausted legs to sprint up the stairs and through the gold-and-glass doors, slamming them open so hard one of them shattered when it hit the wall on the other side. He panted from the effort, one hand trying and failing to put pressure on his wound. He heard more gunshots behind him and hoped JC would be all right, fighting Lewinsky. Andrea had said the man wasn’t a good fighter, and Kris would have to trust his word.

The Queen’s room was even more magnificent than the foyer had been, huge and draped in silks, elegant and opulently furnished, every bit as beautiful as its owner. There was another door on the opposite wall, double wide and clear glass, leading to a balcony that oversaw the desert stretching out behind El Palacio, from the street to the mountains far distant. A beach house as beautiful as this, and the Queen’s private bedroom had a view of the desert, not the ocean. Strange choice; maybe poetic, maybe pretentious. The Queen seemed the type.

There were no other exits he could see and Kris could hear the helicopter blades churning the air overhead through the roof, and he sprinted for the only out available to him - the balcony.

The balcony wasn’t big and definitely wasn’t the correct way to the roof, but Kris knew he didn’t have time to find the stairway up. Instead, ignoring the way every part of him ached and his whole body felt off-balance, he pulled himself up onto the wooden railing, its white paint cracking and peeling, flaking off under his sweat and blood slick hands and boots. It was only a couple inches wide on top, as wide as his palm at most, so he forced himself to take it slow and keep his balance. The winds from the helicopter were strong but not close enough to blow him off. He wobbled dangerously, arms windmilling out beside him and he nearly cried out, but regained his footing after a heart-wrenching moment. His heartbeat pounded in his ears like a war drum, pushing him forward.

After a long moment, collecting himself and trying to breathe, Kris bent his knees and jumped for the overhang.


	30. "Any last words?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kris confronts Perez and the Queen.

Kris’s fingers snagged the edge of the gutter, the metal old and jagged and tearing into his hands. He hissed a breath, his feet only a couple feet up from the wood of the balcony, and ignored the searing pain as he pulled himself up onto the roof in a couple less-than-fluid motions, dragging himself over the edge and bleeding on the shingles from his hands, his knees, his hip. He crawled from the edge of the roof to where it dropped down into the rooftop, sunken in a couple feet and solid concrete, complete with a set of beach chairs for tanning and a helipad, upon which the helicopter rested comfortably.

The Queen was there, as was Perez. The former was half in the helicopter itself, one foot inside when she had turned around as if she’d sensed him. Now she was staring. Perez was talking to the pilot, leaning inside to be heard over the sound of the blades, with her feet firmly on the ground.

Kris tugged his gun back out of his waistband, having tucked it there before he jumped, and aimed it at the Queen, his hand trembling. He drew himself to his feet and put both hands on the pistol for stability. He shot and missed, scratching the black paint of the chopper and drawing Perez’s attention. _Shit._ She pushed the Queen into the helicopter, shouting something Kris didn’t understand (Spanish? English?), but Kris was approaching, spending the rest of his clip, missing and missing every time. He managed to get the Queen in the back of the knee and she screamed, falling to her hands and knees inside the helicopter. The gun clicked uselessly in his hand. Out of bullets. He reached down into his boot only to find that his extra clip was gone. It must have fallen out, somewhere between the beach and here, on the roof. He cursed himself.

“Hazard, back down,” Perez said, and suddenly her bat was in her hand, as if she had pulled it out of thin air - or, well, maybe Kris was out of it. No, Kris was _definitely_ out of it. Two Perezes approached him, expression half pitying under her sunglasses. “This has gone on too long. I told _la reina_ we should have killed you years ago. You will not be permitted to continue to terrorize Her Majesty.”

Kris couldn’t process what she was saying and squinted up at her. _Damn,_ she was tall. “Perez, I-”

She raised her bat one-handed with a snarl and caught him in his left arm, sending jolts up and down as she hit his funny bone wrong, too hard. It didn’t break but it felt like she’d lain a red-hot rod of steel on his skin. He winced, breaths shallow and hissing, and reeled his right fist back to hit her in the face. Her sunglasses skittered across the concrete but she seemed hardly phased, stepping back only once and wiping blood from her nose. She rose her bat once more, two-handed this time and high overhead like she meant to crack his skull with it. He dived out of the way at the last moment, landing on his now-bad arm and jarring his shoulder. Perez honest-to-god growled but not like an animal, like someone only mildly inconvenienced, long hair loose from where it was usually tucked behind her ears. Now it hung around her face and Kris registered distantly that she was prettier than he'd thought, eyes aflame with annoyance and fury.

She came at Kris again and he rolled, avoiding her bat but not the kick she aimed at his torso, hitting him in the middle, near his bullet wound. He rolled again, drawing himself to his feet too fast and nearly falling over in the wave of dizziness and nausea that followed. His head was swimming, his vision going in and out. He couldn’t fight her, not without a gun, and he was in no state to do anything hand to hand. He was losing too much blood, his breath coming too fast and too shallow around the blood and bile in his throat. He looked around the roof for something, _anything_ that would mean he wouldn’t lose, not here, not this far.

Wait, the roof.

He was disoriented and couldn’t see straight, but even he could see the rust-colored streaks on the concrete where he’d climbed onto the roof. He made his way over to them, toward the edge by the street and looked down, Perez watching him all the while, an expression like she couldn't tell if he was still a threat. The fall was far, two stories plus the stilts down to the rocky edge of the cliff. Far and hard enough a fall to die. If he stepped up, if he jumped, all the pain he felt would be over in an instant. The thought was almost too enticing but he shook it off, thinking of JC down below, of Andrea on the beach, the both of them probably worried sick and terrified.

“Rosa, let's go!” the Queen ordered, leaning out of the helicopter as much as she could without standing. Her leg was drenched from the knee down in blood.

“I'll deal with him first,” Perez called back, eyes still fixed on Kris. She approached leisurely slow, maybe- maybe trying to be intimidating? Kris turned back to her, wobbling on his feet.

“Come at me, bro,” he said, half delirious.

Perez glared, huffing out her nose. “It'll hurt less if you jump,” she said, tapping the head of her bat against her leg. “You've caused us a lot of trouble. I'll take great pleasure in spilling your head.”

“Rosa, _please!_ _”_ the Queen shouted, voice high and strained, muffled as if through teeth, but barely audible over the sound of helicopter blades. She could have left without Perez, but was obviously reluctant to. Perez kept her steady pace until Kris had to back up against the edge, the low wall pressing into his calves. She smiled, the first glimmer of an emotion on her face that he'd ever seen.

“Last chance, Hazard,” she said, sounding like she was holding back a laugh.

Kris blinked hard against the fog and looked behind him, at the desert stretching out forever and the balcony down below. El Palacio was silent below, all the gunfire ceased. He turned back to Perez, opened his mouth as if to speak, and dove for her bat.

He took it around the middle, both hands encircling the cool aluminum and yanking, but Perez's grip was like steel. She growled again and took hold of the other end, using the leverage to pull Kris back upright and push him over the roof's edge backwards, teetering dangerously. She leaned with him, over him, and continued to slowly push.

“Any last words?”

Kris took a deep breath and pushed back.

She was strong- stronger than him, stronger than Park, and he couldn't push her far, but his sudden movement caught her by surprise enough that she stumbled just a little, the tension in her thick arms lessening for just an instant. Kris twisted the bat vertical and around the other side, crossing his wrists and swung Perez around so she was the one up against the edge. The dramatic impulse to repeat her words crossed his mind but didn't dare waste the momentary advantage. He pushed the bat against her chest, unbalanced her feet with a weak, awkward kick, and she was gone over the edge. He peered over after her and- and his sight was blurry, but there- that  _looked_ like a lot of blood, a dark stain under a dark figure sprawled impossibly on the earth, so he counted it as a victory.

 _“Rosa!”_ the Queen  _screamed,_ and Kris winced at the high, rough noise, turning to face her. This, at least, would be easy.

 

“Are you here to kill me, Hazard?” she hissed, stepping out of the helicopter and ignoring the shouting of the helicopter pilot. She was using an umbrella as a cane, bare footed and trembling. “Is that what you want? What will it accomplish?”

“You used me,” he said. “You faked Andrea’s death to make me join the Court.”

She barked a laugh, dry, hysterical. “Sounds like  _I_  kept him alive, and like I spared you your life,” she said, bitterly. “How many people have you killed for your petty revenge, _Hazard_ _?_ _”_  She spat his name like a dirty word, like something disgusting she found on the side of the street.

“It’s not the same thing,” Kris said, and he was too out of his mind to really argue with her right now.  _He_  knew he was right, that was all that mattered. “You’re- you’re the bad guy.” He gagged on nothing at all, woozy, swaying on his feet.

The Queen laughed again, longer this time but just as mirthless. “You're a terrorist and a murderer!” she replied. “Don't act like you have some- some  _moral highground._ We're both in the business of doing bad things. My Court, at least, has a  _purpose._  You've never done a worthwhile thing in your life, while I've created a legacy! I-”

“Shut _up,”_ Kris groaned. His head was throbbing, and Christ, he wanted to go home. He was here for one goddamn reason, and fuck the Queen if she thought a fucking  _monologue_ was gonna deter him for one second.

He tore the umbrella from her grip and she fell to her knees. She kept shouting, self-important bullshit falling from her pretty lips like a plea for her life. He kicked her in the chest, stood with one foot on her ribcage to hold her down. He tossed the umbrella to the side and went to her undamaged knee to stomp on it once, twice, thrice. She screamed each time, making Kris’s head pound, but at least she'd stopped talking. He grabbed one of her arms, so thin and delicate he could wrap his whole hand around her wrist, and dragged her to where he’d pushed Perez.

The helicopter took off behind them. Kris didn't have the capacity to process what that may have meant. “Any last words?” he asked, though his words slurred over themselves.

The Queen sniffled, but nodded. “I am Queen Reina Garcia-Jameson,” she said, and Kris raised his eyebrows at the confession. “I am the Queen of the Court of La Sierra. And I will meet you in Hell.”

Kris threw her over the edge without watching her fall.


	31. "I'll see you soon."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The end.

Kris lost his grip on the railing and fell down the last couple stairs into the shattered remains of the chandelier.

“Kris!” a voice shouted, but Kris couldn’t figure out whose it was. He could barely keep his eyes open. “Oh my, we need to get you to a hospital!”

Accented, higher pitched than JC’s- “Andrea?” Kris slurred, trying to squint up at the kid. He felt hands on him, pulling him up onto his knees, and an arm embracing him. Kris couldn’t bring his arms up to reciprocate. He was _exhausted._  “I- Where’s JC?”

Andrea shook his head, his hair brushing Kris’s face where it was buried in the kid’s shoulder. “He’s- He killed Lewinsky, but he’s- I think he’s died of his wounds.” His voice was choking up, wavering. “I’m so sorry, Kris. Did you kill the Queen? And Perez?” Kris grunted an affirmative, but his mind was reeling, his stomach twisting up at the thought – _JC was dead_. Kris abandoned him down here and let him die. It was his fault, _it was his fault._

“No, Kris, it is _not_ your fault,” Andrea said soothingly, petting Kris’s hair with the hand around his back. Kris hadn’t realized he was speaking aloud. The whole room felt like it was spinning. “You did so well, Kris. So good. I am so proud of you.”

There was a searing pain in Kris’s abdomen that wasn’t there before, sudden and piercing and Andrea’s whole body shook, driving the blade into Kris’s stomach further. He twisted the blade and pulled it upward, hard.

The last thing Kris heard was a soft sigh and the click as Andrea slid the pocket knife back into itself. “I’m sorry I had to do this,” he murmured to himself. “But you’re too dangerous. I’ll see you soon.”

Kris choked on blood and disbelief, and was finally swallowed by blackness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading this far! This has been an incredible journey - when I came up with this idea in March of 2015, I never thought Hazard would take over my life. This story and these characters have become incredibly important to me, and this whole experience has given me a sort of confidence in my writing abilities that I hadn't had before. Subscribe to my author page for updates on my other original and fan works, and - eventually - for Hazard 2 and the rest of the series, however long it may be.
> 
> Don't forget to check out my tumblrs, @jstcr (my main) and @raylommen (my writing blog) for even more updates, or to ask me anything at all about me or my projects!
> 
> -Ray

**Author's Note:**

> As always, if you see any errors or have any questions, leave a comment or find me on tumblr @grunkle76 (my main) or @raylommen (my writing blog).
> 
> Thanks so much! -Ray


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